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Cibrarjp  of  Che  theological  ^emmarjp 

PRINCETON  •  NEW  JERSEY 
PRESENTED  BY 

Dr.   F.L.   Patton 

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The  Argument 


V 


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OF   THE 


JUN  "9  1914 


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Book  of  Job  Unfolded. 


BY 


WILLIAM   HENRY   GREEN,  D.D., 

PROFESSOR   IN    PRINCETON    THEOLOGICAL   SEMINARY. 


NEW    YORK: 

ROBERT  CARTER  AND  BROTHERS, 

530  Broadway. 

1874. 


Entered  according  to  Act  of  Congress  in  the  year  1873,  by 

ROBERT  CARTER  AND  BROTHERS, 

In  the  Office  of  the  Librarian  of  Congress,  at  Washington. 


CAMBRIDGE  : 
PRESS   OF    JOHN    WILSON    AND   SON. 


PREFACE. 


TT  may  be  worth  considering  whether  current 
methods  of  dealing  with  the  Bible  do  not  favor 
a  fragmentary,  rather  than  a  comprehensive,  knowl- 
edge of  the  sacred  volume.  The  attention  given 
to  detached  and  scattered  portions  of  Scripture 
should  be  corrected  or  supplemented  by  the  careful 
study  of  entire  books,  by  him  who  aspires,  as  every 
Christian  should,  to  a  thorough  acquaintance  with 
the  word  of  God.  It  is  in  the  hope  of  encouraging 
and  aiding  such  a  study  of  the  book  of  Job  that 
this  volume  has  been  prepared.  It  is  not  a  contin- 
uous commentary,  occupying  itself  with  the  expo- 
sition in  detail  of  each  successive  paragraph  or 
sentence.  Nor  is  it  concerned  with  the  vexed 
questions  of  its  age  or  authorship.  Its  aim  is 
simply  to  set  forth  its  general  drift,  to  exhibit  its 
plan  and  structure,  and  trace  the  course  of  thought 
from  first  to  last  by  showing  the  part  taken  by  each 


2  PREFACE. 

of  the  actors,  the  purport  of  their  several  speeches, 
and  the  bearing  of  each  portion  of  the  book  upon 
the  common  theme  of  the  whole.  Such  a  compre- 
hensive survey  as  is  here  proposed  will  be  an 
excellent  preparation  for  more  detailed  study  subse- 
quently. And  the  coherence  of  parts  thus  exhibited 
furnishes  the  best  demonstration  of  the  unity  of 
this  remarkable  book  against  those  who  have  ven- 
tured to  apply  to  it  the  critical  knife. 

The  author  hopes  that  this  humble  effort  may 
be  of  some  service  in  promoting  a  better  under- 
standing and  a  higher  appreciation  of  the  book  of 
Job,  among  both  ministers  and  laymen.  And  he 
will  be  particularly  happy  if  any  afflicted  child  of 
God  can  be  assisted  in  drawing  the  waters  of  con- 
solation from  this  inspired  and  copious  source. 

Princeton,  N.  J.,  Oct.  ii,  1873. 


CONTENTS. 


Chapter  Pack 

I.    Job's  Happy  Estate 7 

II.     Satan 4i 

III.  Job  in  Affliction 12> 

IV.  Job's  Three  Friends m 

V.    Job's  Conflict 149 

VI.    Job's  Triumph 181 

VII.    Job  Refutes  his  Friends 221 

VIII.     Elihu 245 

IX.    The  Lord 285 

X.    The  Place  of  the  Book  of  Job    in  the 

Scheme  of  Holy  Scripture     ....  325 


Explanatory  Note.     The   Doctrine  of  Immor- 
tality      357 

Analysis  of  the  Book  of  Job      367 


CHAPTER   I. 


Titer e  zvas  a  man  m  the  land  of  Us^  whose  name 
ivas  Job  ;  and  that  mail  was  perfect  and  upright,  and 
one  that  feared  God,  and  eschewed  evil.  —  Job  i.  i. 


JOB'S    HAPPY    ESTATE. 


nPHE  book  of  Job  is  one  of  the  most 
remarkable  in  the  Okl  Testament. 
Apart  from  its  inspiration,  and  considered 
simply  as  a  literary  production,  it  bears  the 
stamp  of  uncommon  genius.  It  is  occupied 
with  a  profound  and  difficult  theme,  the  mys- 
tery of  divine  providence  in  the  sufferings 
of  good  men.  This  is  not  treated  in  the 
abstract,  in  simple  prose  or  in  a  plain  didac- 
tic method.  But  an  actual  case  is  set  vividly 
before  the  reader,  in  which  the  difficulty  ap- 
pears in  its  most  aggravated  form.  By  an 
extraordinary  accumulation  of  disasters  a 
man  of  unexampled  piety  is  suddenly  cast 
down  from  his  prosperity,  and  reduced  to 
the   most  pitiable  and  distressed   condition. 

1* 


8  job's  happy  estate. 

And  then  there  is  delineated  in  the  most 
masterly  manner  the  impression  made  on 
others  by  the  spectacle  of  these  calamities,^  as 
well  as  the  inward  conflict  stirred  in  the  suf- 
ferer himself,  his  bewilderment  and  sore 
distress,  his  alternations  of  despair  and  hope, 
his  piteous  entreaties  for  a  sympathy  which 
is  denied  him.  and  his  irritation  under  the 
unjust  suspicions  and  censures  which  are 
cast  upon  him,  his  wild  and  almost  passion- 
ate complaints  against  the  Providence  which 
crushes  him,  intermingled  with  expressions 
of  strong  confidence  in  God  which  he  cannot 
abandon.  This  wild  tumult  in  his  soul  is 
graphically  depicted  in  its  successive  stages, 
until  we  are  brought  to  the  final  solution  of 
the  whole,  and  the  vindication  at  once  of  the 
providence  of  God  and  of  His  suffering  ser- 
vant. And  all  this  is  set  forth  in  the  loftiest 
style  of  poetry,  abounding  in  fine  imagery 
and  containing  passages  of  deep  pathos  as 
well  as  of  rare  sublimity  and  power ;  while 
the  whole  presentation  and  treatment  of  the 
case  is  manasfed  with  consummate  skill. 


JOB  S    HAPPY    ESTATE.  9 

The  book  of  Job  well  deserves  the  high 
encomiums  which  have  been  bestowed  upon 
it  as  a  product  of  the  poetic  art.  And  while 
we  humbly  receive  its  inspired  lessons,  there 
is  no  reason  why  we  should  be  insensible  to 
its  graceful  beauty,  or  refuse  to  recognize  its 
other  attractions.  The  Bible  is  not,  indeed, 
amenable  to  the  laws  of  criticism,  nor  to  be 
judged  of  by  ordinary  standards  of  taste. 
When  God  speaks  to  us,  we  must  reverently 
listen  and  obey,  however  homely  the  medium 
throuQ^h  which  He  communicates  His  will. 
And  yet  it  adds  to  the  variety  of  this  holy 
book,  and  to  its  adaptation  to  the  needs  of 
all  classes  of  men,  and  to  all  the  cravings  of 
the  human  soul,  that  it  addresses  itself  like- 
wise to  the  refined  taste  and  the  cultivated 
sense.  Like  the  inexhaustible  supplies  of 
Nature  in  its  manifold  diversity,  the  volume 
of  divine  revelation  gives  us  not  only  the 
massive  granite  and  the  ponderous  metal,  but 
the  sparkling  and  polished  gems  of  thought ; 
not  only  the  staple  articles  of  food,  but  the 
rarer  and  more  palatable  delicacies.     So  that 


lO  JOBS    HAPPY    ESTATE. 

the  charms  and  the  embellishments  of  poetic 
genius,  which  invest  other  subjects  with  such 
attractions,  are  lent  likewise  to  the  sacred 
oracles  in  the  sweet  lyrics  of  David,  the  im- 
passioned fire  of  Isaiah,  and  the  marvellous 
beauty  of  the  book  of  Job. 

The  principal  personage  of  this  book,  and 
the  one  about  whom  the  interest  chiefly  cen- 
tres, is  Job  himself,  a  venerable  and  patriar- 
chal character,  whose  fortunes  are  detailed  to 
us  at  an  important  crisis  of  his  life.  Some 
have  thought  that  he  was  not  a  real,  histori- 
cal person,  and  that  the  narrative  of  the  book 
is  not  one  of  events  which  actually  took 
place,  but  that  it  is  rather  a  fiction  or  a  para- 
ble like  that  of  the  Prodigal  Son  or  the  good 
Samaritan,  and  he  is  designed  to  represent 
not  some  one  person  to  whom  all  this  hap- 
pened precisely  as  is  here  detailed,  but  a 
whole  class,  such  as  is  often  met  with  in  real 
life,  of  similar  character  and  similar  experi- 
ences, and  the  truth  of  which  lies  in  its 
general  conformity  to  what  repeatedly  takes 
place,  and  in  the  correctness  of  the  lessons 


JOB  S    HAPPY    ESTATE.  I  I 

conveyed.  This,  however,  cannot  have  been 
the  case.  It  is  related  not  as  a  parable,  but 
as  a  history,  instructive  throughout,  as  all  the 
Bible  histories  are,  but  still  an  actual,  veri- 
table occurrence.  And  Job  is  spoken  of  in 
other  parts  of  Scripture  as  a  real  person,  and 
in  connection  with  other  real  persons  like 
Noah  and  Daniel,  and  the  events  of  his  life 
are  referred  to  in  a  manner  which  implies 
that  they  had  actually  occurred.  We  can 
have  no  doubt,  therefore,  that,  with  all  the 
poetic  embellishment  of  the  narrative,  Job 
did  actually  live,  and  the  history  took  place 
substantially  as  it  is  here  related. 

That  which  is  in  this  chapter  proposed  for 
consideration  in  the  life  of  Job  is  his  charac- 
ter and  condition  when  he  is  first  introduced 
to  our  notice,  his  great  excellence  and  piety 
and  his  happy,  prosperous  state,  as  these  are 
sketched  briefly,  but  strongly,  in  the  opening 
verses  of  the  first  chapter,  and  again  in  chap. 
xxix.,  where,  after  his  gloomy  reverses.  Job 
pathetically  recalls  the  joys  of  former  years. 

We  commonly  think  of  Job  as  a  sufferer ; 


I  2  JOB  S    HAPPY    ESTATE. 

and  the  lessons  that  we  mostly  associate  with 
him  are  those  which  concern  affliction.  His 
great  sorrows  form  indeed  the  grand  crisis  of 
his  life ;  and  it  is  to  their  exhibition,  together 
with  the  attendant  principles  of  the  divine 
administration,  that  this  book  is  chiefly 
devoted.  But  the  very  point  of  the  whole 
lies  in  their  exceptional  character,  which  re- 
quires an  explanation.  If  this  were  not  so, 
there  would  be  no  mystery  to  be  elucidated. 
The  enio^ma  is  in  the  contrast  between  what 
Job  had  to  endure  and  what  it  might  be 
expected  would  befall  such  a  man  as  he ; 
what  is  in  fact  the  ordinary  experience  of 
such  men,  and  what  had  been  Job's  own 
experience  up  to  the  time  when  he  was 
overtaken  by  these  extraordinary  calamities. 
"  Godliness  is  profitable  unto  all  things,  hav- 
ing the  promise  of  the  life  that  now  is,  and 
of  that  which  is  to  come."  This  was  fulfilled 
in  the  life  of  Job  up  to  the  time  of  his  heavy 
trial,  which  had  been  one  continued  course 
of  prosperity  and  happiness.  It  seemed  as 
though  nothing  were  left  him  to  desire.     As 


JOB  S    HAPPY    ESTATE.  I  3 

he  himself  expresses  it :  "In  the  days  when 
God  preserved  me,  when  his  candle  shined 
upon  my  head,  ...  I  washed  my  steps  with 
butter,  and  the  rock  poured  me  out  rivers  of 
oil;  .  .  .  my  root  was  spread  out  by  the 
waters,  and  the  dew  lay  all  night  upon  my 
branch."  The  freshness  of  a  well-watered  tree, 
the  richness  of  butter  and  oil,  the  brilliancy 
of  God's  own  light,  are  the  figures  which  set 
forth  his  joyful  and  prosperous  abundance. 
And,  as  the  tempter  sneeringly  said,  Job  had 
not  feared  God  for  nought.  God  had  made 
an  hedo^e  about  him  and  about  his  house 
and  about  all  that  he  had  on  every  side. 
He  had  blessed  the  work  of  his  hands,  and 
his  substance  was  increased  in  the  land. 

While,  therefore,  we  go  very  properly  to 
Job's  dark  hours  to  learn  the  uses  of  afflic- 
tion, and  all  the  salutary  lessons  which  accom- 
pany it,  it  behooves  us  likewise  to  remember 
the  lesson  of  all  those  years  which  had  pre- 
ceded ;  viz.,  that  God's  blessing  attends  the 
righteous.  "He  that  will  love  life,  and  see 
good  days,  let  him   refrain   his  tongue  from 


14  JOB  S    HAPPY    ESTATE. 

evil,  and  his  lips  that  they  speak  no  guile  : 
let  him  eschew  evil,  and  do  good  :  let  him 
seek  peace,  and  ensue  it.  For  the  eyes  of 
the  Lord  are  over  the  righteous,  and  his  ears 
are  open  unto  their  prayers  ;  but  the  face  of 
the  Lord  is  against  them  that  do  evil." 
(i    Pet.  iii.   IO-I2.) 

Let  us  attend,  then,  to  the  piety  and  to  the 
happy  estate  of  Job,  with  the  view  of  taking 
note  how  these  are  combined  in  the  ordinary 
providence  of  God.  It  is  not  said  that  there 
are  no  exceptions.  There  are  such  excep- 
tions. There  are  grave  and  weighty  reasons 
why  there  should  be.  Job  himself  was  a 
notable  exception  at  one  epoch  in  his  life. 
Nevertheless  the  ordinary  rule  remains;  and 
in  the  number  and  the  mystery  of  the  excep- 
tions we  must  not  forget  that  it  is  the  rule,  a 
rule  verified  for  the  most  part  even  in  the 
general  tenor  of  their  lives  who  constitute 
the  most  signal  exceptions,  a  rule  which  found 
its  evident  exemplification  in  the  greater  por- 
tion of  the  life  of  Job  himself.  Goodness 
and  happiness  go  hand  in  hand  in  the  ordi- 
nary experiences  of  this  world. 


JOBS    HAPPY    ESTATE.  1 5 

Let  US  review,  in  the  first  instance,  the 
simple  description  here  given  of  the  piety 
of  Job.  He  is  evidently  portrayed  as  a 
model  man.  God  Himself  says  of  him,  "  There 
is  none  like  him  in  the  earth."  And  in  the 
delineation  of  Job's  piety  notice,  first,  two 
negative  particulars,  two  omissions  in  the 
narrative,  which  are  highly  significant,  espe- 
cially as  found  in  a  book  belonging  to  the  Old 
Testament. 

The  first  is  that  no  account  is  made  of 
ancestry  or  of  connection  with  the  covenant 
people  of  God.  There  is  no  mention  of 
Job's  parentage,  no  hint  of  his  relationship 
to  Abraham.  He  was  plainly  not  one  of  his 
descendants.  Now  if  what  secures  the  favor 
of  God  be  a  pious  ancestry,  or  a  connection 
with  the  outward  visible  Church,  it  is  unac- 
countable that  in  the  case  of  Job,  held  up  as 
a  model  before  all  ages  and  generations,  and 
of  whom  God  gives  such  a  testimony  as  he 
does  of  no  other,  that  these  things  are  not  so 
much  as  once  alluded  to,  even  for  the  sake  of 
explaining  their  absence  or  omission.     Evi- 


i6  job's  happy  estate. 

dently  It  Is  not  outward  associations  or  con- 
nections, though  of  the  most  sacred  kind, 
that  constitute  the  evidence  and  pledge  of 
God's  favor,  but  personal  character  and  hfe. 
In  every  nation  and  In  every  communion,  he 
that  feareth  God  and  worketh  righteousness 
is  accepted  of  Him.  The  Important  question 
is  not.  Are  you  a  Jew  or  a  Gentile  ?  Are  you 
a  member  of  this  or  that  particular  branch 
of  God's  visible  Church  ?  Nor  even.  Are  you 
a  member  of  any  outward  body  of  professing 
Christians  whatever  ?  but.  Have  you  person- 
ally that  character  which  Is  acceptable  to  God, 
and  are  you  leading  a  life  that  Is  pleasing  in 
His  sight  ? 

A  second  omission  in  the  account  of  Job's 
piety  similarly  significant  Is  that  It  is  not 
described  as  consisting  of  ceremonial  observ- 
ances. No  mention  Is  made  of  any  round 
of  ritual  service,  no  fasts  or  purifications  or 
tithes,  no  rigorous  periods  of  abstinence  or 
self-mortification  or  ascetic  observance,  no 
priestly  Intervention  or  sacerdotal  absolu- 
tion, no   holy  order  of  men   through  whom 


JOBS    HAPPY    ESTATE.  1 7 

grace  was  dispensed  as  its  sole  appointed 
channel.  The  only  religious  rite  referred  to 
is  the  simple  sacrificial  worship  of  patriarchal 
times,  maintained  in  faith  of  the  sacrifice  and 
the  atonement  that  was  to  come,  and  which 
was  afterwards  accomplished  by  the  Son  of 
God  on  Calvary.  Job  was  priest  in  his  own 
house ;  his  own  hands  offered  the  sacrifice, 
though  devoid  of  the  grace  of  orders,  and 
without  priestly  consecration,  and  it  was 
accepted.  Job's  religion  was  one  of  the  heart 
and  of  the  life,  not  of  ritualistic  service. 

And  it  is  the  more  striking  because  this  is 
a  model  of  piety  belonging  to  the  Old  Tes- 
tament. It  is  another  illustration  of  the  pains 
that  were  taken,  even  under  that  restricted 
and  legal  economy,  to  fortify  the  people 
against  that  spirit  of  bigotry  and  Phariseeism 
into  which  they  were  so  prone  to  fall,  and 
did  fall,  and  which  has  in  fact  been  the  bane 
of  vital  religion  in  every  age.  Here  was  an 
outstanding  and  shining  example.  Job  was 
an  eminent  saint  of  God,  though  his  line  of 
descent  was  not  counted  from  Abraham,  and 


1 8  job's  happy  estate. 

though  he  did  not  practise  the  multiplied  rites 
of  the  Mosaic  ceremonial.  Whatever  advan- 
tages there  may  be  in  an  outward  connection 
with  the  people  of  God  or  the  visible  Church, 
and  whatever  benefit  may  arise  from  outward 
attendance  upon  the  services  of  religion, —  and 
certainly  neither  of  these  are  to  be  decried 
or  undervalued,  when  rightly  understood  and 
put  in  their  proper  place,  —  that  piety  which 
has  the  approbation  of  God  is  something  dif- 
ferent from  them  and  independent  of  them. 

The  general  description  of  Job's  piety  is 
given  briefly  and  simply  in  four  particulars : 
he  was^  psrfect  and  upright,  and  one  that 
feared  God,  and  eschewed  evil.  But  this 
statement,  brief  as  it  is,  is  very  comprehen- 
sive. ''  He  was  perfect  and  upright."  Up- 
rightness denotes,  in  the  first  place,  honesty, 
straightforwardness,  sincerity.  There  was  no 
double  dealing  or  duplicity,  no  hypocritical 
pretence  with  Job,  either  towards  God  or 
man.  He  was  sincere  In  his  professions  and 
honest  in  his  practice.  Uprightness,  more- 
over, means  conformity  to   the   standard   of 


JOBS    HAPPY    ESTATE.  ig 

right,  and  this  both  inwardly  and  outwardly. 
We  read  both  of  the  upright  in  heart  and  of 
the  man  that  is  upright  in  his  way.  He  was 
a  man  of  integrity,  therefore,  both  in  spirit 
and  in  life,  —  a  man  attentive  to  his  obligations 
both  to  God  and  man,  and  who  punctually 
discharged  them.  And,  with  all,  he  was  per- 
fect,—  perfect  and  upright,  perfect  in  his 
uprightness.  Perfect,  not  of  course  in  that 
sense  in  which,  according  to  the  uniform 
teaching  of  Scripture,  and  the  universal  ex- 
perience of  men,  perfection  is  unattainable 
in  this  life.  Not  that  he  was  absolutely  fault- 
less, for  there  is  no  man  that  liveth  and  sin- 
neth  not.  Job  never  claimsspotless  innocence. 
He  himself  says,  "  I  have  sinned ;  what  shall 
I  do  unto  Thee,  O  Thou  Preserver  of  men  ?  " 
*'  How  should  man  be  just  with  God  ?  If  he  will 
contend  with  Him;  he  cannot  answer  Him  one 
of  a  thousand."  "  If  I  justify  myself,  mine 
own  mouth  shall  condemn  me :  if  I  say,  I 
am  perfect,  it  shall  also  prove  me  perverse." 
But  he  was  perfect  in  the  sense  of  complete- 
ness.    His  uprightness  was  not  of  that  par- 


20  JOB  S    HAPPY    ESTATE. 

tial,  limited  kind,  which  restricts  itself  to 
certain  classes  of  duties,  while  neglecting 
others ;  or  confines  itself  to  special  times  and 
occasions,  while  at  others  it  is  laid  aside ; 
w^hich  is  very  zealous  about  some  of  the  com- 
mandments, to  the  disregard  of  others,  tithing 
it  may  be  the  mint,  anise,  and  cummin  with 
scrupulous  exactness,  while  neglecting  the 
weightier  matters  of  the  law,  or  manifest- 
ing great  devotion  on  Sabbath  days  or  pe- 
riods of  special  religious  observance,  while 
the  duties  of  other  days  are  overlooked.  A 
man  who  can  be  devout  in  Church  and  dis- 
honest in  his  business,  penitently  ask  God's 
forgiveness  and  yet  be  unforgiving  himself, 
who  can  profess  great  love  to  the  Saviour 
and  yet  be  heartless  to  Christ's  needy  poor, 
this  was  not  the  style  of  Job's  piety.  He 
was  perfect  as  well  as  upright.  There  was 
a  completeness  in  his  piety,  which  compassed 
the  whole  round  of  obligation.  He  studied 
conformity  to  the  rule  of  right  in  all  things, 
at  all  times,  under  all  circumstances. 

And   the    spring  of   this  perfectness  and 


JOB  S    HAPPY    ESTATE.  2  I 

uprightness,  or  this  complete  Integrity,  was 
that  he  feared  God.  He  set  the  will  of  God 
before  him  as  his  rule,  the  glory  of  God  as 
his  end,  the  approbation  of  God  as  his  high- 
est reward.  In  this  pious  fear  of  God  he 
walked  all  the  day  long.  This  was  his  grand 
motive,  overpowering  every  thing  else.  This 
closed  his  ear  against  the  siren  song  of 
temptation.  This  shut  his  eyes  to  every 
gilded  lure  of  sin.  The  one  thought,  "  Thou 
God  seest  me,"  was  his  safeguard  and  his 
stimulus.  This  impelled  him  to  prompt  and 
ready  obedience  to  every  divine  command. 
This  made  him  steadfast  in  his  uprightness, 
and  led  to  his  perfectness  and  completeness 
in  it. 

It  also  led  to  the  sedulous  avoidance  of  Its 
opposite,  and  thus  completed  the  perfect 
square  by  the  fourth  side,  which  is  the  finish- 
ing stroke  to  this  description  of  a  well-regu- 
lated piety.  He  "  eschewed  evil :  "  he  carefully 
shunned  all  sin,  kept  aloof  from  every  thing 
that  was  wrong  In  heart,  speech,  and  behav- 
ior.     Some  eminently  good   and  holy  men 


22  JOBS    HAPPY    ESTATE. 

have  great  blemishes ;  they  apparently  -lay 
out  all  their  strength  on  the  positive  side  of 
religion,  and  neglect  its  negative ;  they  en- 
deavor strenuously  to  do  right,  and  forget  to 
strive  against  doing  wrong.  And  thus^they 
leave  the  periphery  of  the  Christian  character 
unfinished :  the  last  side,  which  completes  the 
whole,  and  gives  it  symmetry,  is  never  added. 
A  great  gap  is  left  unfilled.  There  was  no 
such  lamentable  deficiency  in  the  case  of 
Job.  "  He  w^as  perfect  and  upright,  and  one 
that  feared  God,  and  eschewed  evil." 

Besides  this  general  description  of  Job's 
pious  integrity,  two  special  traits  are  inciden- 
tally mentioned  in  different  parts  of  the  book, 
by  which  he  was  particularly  characterized, 
and  which  belonged  to  him  in  separate  walks 
of  life.  Not  as  though  these  were  by  any 
means  the  only  ways  in  which  his  piety  mani- 
fested itself.  But  they  were  marked  and 
prominent,  and  they  may  serve  as  illustra- 
tions of  his  habitual  piety  and  consistency  in 
two  several  spheres  ;  viz.,  at  home  and  abroad, 
in   the  intimacies  of  the  domestic  circle  and 


JOBS    HAPPY    ESTATE.  23 

in  his  intercourse  with  others  less  nearly- 
related  to  him.  In  regard  to  the  former, 
mention  is  made  of  a  fact  which  serves  to 
show  Job's  pious  regard  for  the  spiritual  wel- 
fare of  his  children.  It  was  the  sacred  habit 
of  the  family  to  throw  the  safeguards  of  re- 
ligion around  every  period  of  mutual  enter- 
tainment and  social  enjoyment.  Whenever 
his  children  gathered,  as  they  regularly  did, 
at  each  other's  houses  on  festive  occasions, 
cementing  and  displaying  their  fond  fraternal 
affection,  it  was  Job's  invariable  custom  to 
summon  all  together  afterwards,  and  sanctif}^ 
them,  and  offer  burnt  offerings  according  to 
the  number  of  them  all.  For  Job  said,  "  It 
maybe  that  my  sons  have  sinned,  and  cursed 
God  in  their  hearts."  "  Cursed  God  "  is  too 
strong  an  expression  for  the  meaning  intended 
here.  It  is  not  blasphemy,  or  defiance  of 
God,  or  malignant  hatred  of  His  service  that 
he  feared.  The  word  is  properly  a  formula 
of  blessing,  used  in  taking  leave  of  friends. 
It  is  commonly  translated  "  bless,"  and  is  the 
same  that  is  employed  where  it  is  said,  "  And 

2 


24  JOB  S    HAPPY    ESTATE. 

Laban  kissed  his  sons  and  his  daughters,  and 
blessed  them,  and  departed."  (Gen.  xxxi.  55.) 
"  So  Joshua  blessed  them,  and  sent  them 
away  "  (Josh.  xxii.  6) ;  that  is,  he  took  leave 
of  them,  he  said  farewell  to  them,  he  bid  them 
adieu.  Job  was  afraid  that  his  sons  might 
have  said  farewell  to  God  in  their  hearts  ; 
that  they  might  have  taken  leave  of  Him  ; 
that,  in  their  thoughtless  hilarity,  they  might 
have  forgotten  God  and  His  presence,  and 
acted  as  though  they  were  out  of  His  sight. 
He  recalls  them  to  solemn  thought  and  to 
their  Maker's  service,  while  he  solicits  the 
pardon  of  their  sins  by  the  offering  of  sacri- 
fices according  to  the  number  of  them  all. 

Job's  piety  manifested  itself  at  home  in 
thoughtful  care  for  his  children's  spiritual 
good.  But  it  was  not  limited  to  his  own 
household.  He  sought  the  good  of  all.  And 
he  was  especially  forward  in  the  relief  of  the 
necessitous  and  the  protection  of  the  injured. 
"  When  the  ear  heard  me,"  he  says,  "  then  it 
blessed  me  ;  and  when  the  eye  saw  me,  it 
gave  witness  to  me  :  because  I  delivered  the 


JOBS    HAPPY    ESTATE.  25 

poor  that  cried,  and  the  fatherless,  and  him 
that  had  none  to  help  him.  The  blessing  of 
him  that  was  ready  to  perish  came  upon  me : 
and  I  caused  the  widow's  heart  to  sine  for 
joy.  ...  I  was  eyes  to  the  blind,  and  feet 
was  I  to  the  lame.  I  was  a  father  to  the 
poor.  ...  And  I  brake  the  jaws  of  the 
wicked,  and  plucked  the  spoil  out  of  his 
teeth." 

We  are  further  told  that  Job's  outward  lot 
was  as  happy  as  his  character  was  exemplary. 
God's  blessing  was  in  the  most  marked  man- 
ner bestowed  upon  his  faithful  servant,  bring- 
ing him  the  most  distinguished  prosperity. 
He  was  happy  in  his  family,  having  seven 
sons  and  three  daughters,  who  were  all  settled 
near  each  other,  and  near  their  paternal 
home,  and  lived  in  the  most  delightful  har- 
mony and  fraternal  intercourse.  He  had 
large  possessions :  his  wealth  in  flocks  and 
herds  is  recited,  and  it  is  added  that  he  was 
the  greatest  of  all  the  men  of  the  East.  And 
he  was  treated  with  the  utmost  deference  and 
respect  by  all  classes,  and  held  in  the  highest 


26  job's  happy  estate. 

esteem.  He  says  in  his  retrospect  *  of  these 
happy  days :  "  When  I  went  out  to  the  gate 
through  the  city,  when  I  prepared  my  seat  in 
the  street,  the  young  men  saw  me,  and  hid 
themselves  :  and  the  aged  arose,  and  stood  up. 
The  princes  refrained  talking,  and  laid  their 
hand  on  their  mouth.  ...  I  chose  out  theii 
way,  and  sat  chief,  and  dwelt  as  a  king  in  the 
army."  There  seemed  to  be  nothing  to  be 
desired  in  the  way  of  worldly  prosperity  or 
earthly  joy,  beyond  what  he  possessed. 

Our  thoughts  are  turned  so  frequently  to 
the  discipline  of  affliction  and  the  spiritual 
profit  which  arises  out  of  it,  that  we  are  in 
some  danger,  perhaps,  of  losing  sight  of  the 
rule  in  the  prominence  which  is  given  to  the 
exception.  And  yet  religion  has  its  temporal 
as  well  as  its  eternal  rewards.  The  blessing 
of  God  attends  the  good,  even  in  this  present 
life  and  in  regard  to  their  worldly  estate. 
There  are  promises  of  long  life  and  pros- 
perity, as  far  as  it  shall  serve  for  God's  glory, 
and  their  own  good,  to  all  those  that  keep  His 
commandments.     "  Blessed  is  every  one  that 


/  JOBS    HAPPY    ESTATE.  27 

feareth  the  Lord;  that  walketh  in  His  ways. 
For  thou  shalt  eat  the  labor  of  thine  hands  : 
happy  shalt  thou  be,  and  it  shall  be  well  with 
thee."  "  Evil  doers  shall  be  cut  off :  but 
those  that  wait  upon  the  Lord,  they  shall 
inherit  the  earth."  "  Verily  there  is  a  reward 
for  the  righteous :  verily  he  is  a  God  that 
judgeth  in  the  earth." 

It  is  true  that  worldly  possessions  bring  a 
snare.  And  our  Saviour  said  that  it  is  a  hard 
thing  for  them  that  have  riches  to  enter  into 
the  kingdom  of  God.  And  an  apostle  adds, 
Not  many  wise  men  after  the  flesh,  not  many 
mighty,  not  many  noble,  are  called.  So  like- 
wise another  apostle :  Hath  not  God  chosen 
the  poor  of  this  world,  rich  in  faith,  and  heirs 
of  the  kingdom  ?  There  is  a  peril,  no  doubt, 
in  having  a  large  share  of  this  world's  good. 
The  danger  is  of  cleaving  to  the  world  unduly, 
and  of  setting  the  affections  upon  earthly 
comforts  and  earthly  pleasures, —  of  being  con- 
tent with  an  earthly  portion  and  ceasing  to 
strive  after  or  long  for  one  that  is  heavenly. 
If  the  heart  is  given  to  the  world,  and  worldly 


28  job's  happy  estate. 

objects,  be  they  what  they  may,  become  our 
end  and  aim,  then  we  are  worldly-minded  and 
are  not  the  servants  of  God.  If  any  man 
love  the  world,  the  love  of  the  Father  is  not 
in  him.  Ye  cannot  serve  God  and  Mammon. 
They  that  will  be  rich,  i.e.,  that  seek  riches 
as  their  chief  good,  and  make  this  their 
main,  controlling  object  of  pursuit,  fall  into 
temptation  and  a  snare,  and  into  many  foolish 
and  hurtful  lusts,  which  drown  men  in  destruc- 
tion and  perdition.  The  love  of  money  is  a 
root  of  all  evil.  Our  Saviour's  rule  is,  seek 
first  the  kingdom  of  God  and  His  righteous- 
ness, —  first  in  order  of  time,  first  in  impor- 
tance, first  in  the  urgency  of  desire  and  in 
the  strenuousness  of  endeavor,  —  and  all 
other  things  shall  be  added  unto  you. 

If  this  true  order  is  preserved,  then  other 
tilings  may  be  safely  added,  and  no  harm 
will  result.  The  damage  arises  from  the  pre- 
vaiHng  disposition  to  invert  this  order,  to  seek 
the  world  first,  and  then  as  much  of  heaven 
as  can  be  had  without  too  great  a  sacrifice  of 
worldly  interests.     Now  upon  the  basis  both 


JOB  S    HAPPY    ESTATE.  29 

of  Scriptural  teaching  and  of  the  common 
experience  of  men,  it  may  confidently  be 
affirmed  that  the  true  way  to  a  happy  life, 
even  in  this  world,  is  found  in  the  service  of 
God.  Our  Saviour  announced  the  universal 
law  when  he  said,  "  Whosoever  will  save  his 
life,  shall  lose  it :  and  whosoever  will  lose  his 
life  for  my  sake,  shall  find  it."  This  is  a 
seeming  paradox,  but  it  is  perpetually  veri- 
fied. He  who  aims  at  worldly  good  fails  to 
attain  it.  He  either  is  unable  to  acquire  that 
form  of  worldly  good  which  he  seeks,  or,  if  he 
gets  possession  of  it,  he  does  not  find  it  what 
he  expected  :  it  proves  to  be  empty  and  un- 
substantial, and  does  not  yield  the  satisfaction 
which  he  anticipated  and  desired.  But  he  who 
abandons  this  world  as  his  object,  and  aims 
at  God's  glory  instead,  gains  that  and  this 
world  too.  It  is  as  in  the  case  of  Solomon, 
who  prayed  not  for  riches,  nor  for  long  life,  but 
for  wisdom.  God  gave  him  that  he  asked  : 
He  gave  him  wisdom,  and  added  long  life  and 
riches  besides.  Selfishness  defeats  itself :  in 
grasping  with  desperate  eagerness  after  earthly 


30  JOBS    HAPPY    ESTATE. 

good,  it  snatches  a  painted  bubble,  which  bursts 
in  its  hands.  Our  truest  welfare  and  highest 
happiness,  even  if  we  limit  our  view  to  the 
present  life,  will  be  most  effectually  secured 
by  faithfully  serving  God  and  doing  His  will. 
It  has  passed  into  a  proverb  that  honesty  is 
the  best  policy.  In  a  like  sense  and  with 
similar  limitations  it  is  equally  true  that  piety 
is  the  best  policy.  He  who  refuses  to  defraud 
his  neighbor,  not  from  any  principle  of  integ- 
rity, but  simply  because  he  will  thus  in  the 
end  enhance  his  gains,  does  not  deserve  the 
praise  of  real  honesty.  And  he  who  adopts 
the  guise  of  piety  to  further  worldly  ends 
forfeits  alike  the  approbation  of  God  and  the 
esteem  of  men.  Nevertheless  goodness  has 
its  temporal  rewards.  Length  of  days  is  in 
Wisdom's  right  hand,  and  in  her  left  riches 
and  honor. 

That  this  is  so  in  the  general,  and  in  its 
application  to  communities  and  masses  of 
men,  is  obvious  upon  its  simple  statement. 

Religion  fosters  those  qualities  and  habits 
which  tend  to  worldly  prosperity  and  success 


JOBS    HAPPY    ESTATE.  3 1 

and   to  the  promotion  of  the  general  good. 
It  encourages  industry,  thrift,  and  frugahty, 
and  thus  lends  its  aid  to  accumulation,  while 
on  the  other  hand  it  represses  all  those  forms 
of   vicious   indulgence  which  lead  to  profli- 
gacy, neglect  of  proper  occupation,  and  waste- 
ful dissipation.     A  large  part  of  the  extreme 
poverty  and    suffering    that  is  found  in  the 
world  is  either  directly  or  indirectly  the  con- 
sequence of  criminal  or  vicious  conduct,  its 
natural   and  inevitable   retribution   affecting 
the  vicious   themselves  or   those   connected 
with  them.     And  it  is  not  the  evils  of  de- 
graded poverty  alone  that  arise  in  this  way, 
but  miseries  that  affect  wealthier  classes,  des- 
olating families  in  high  life,  withering  every 
joy,  and  blighting  all  their  possessions.     God 
has  set  the  brand  of  his  disapprobation  upon 
sin  by  these  moral  sequences,  which  he  has 
fixed   in  the  world  and  by  which  a  penalty 
has  been  fastened  to  transgression.     These 
consequences    can    only  be    averted  by  dry- 
ing up  the  sources  of  the  evil ;  and  this  re- 
ligion does. 


32  JOB  S    HAPPY    ESTATE. 

Another  fertile  cause  of  suffering  and  sor- 
row in  the  world,  which  the  prevalence  of 
true  religion  would  obliterate,  is  the  injustice 
and  unkindness  of  man  to  his  fellow-man. 
The  strong  oppress  the  weak,  and  they  who 
cannot  defend  themselves  are  mercilessly 
trodden  in  the  dust.  Each  man  becomes  the 
antagonist  of  his  fellow,  w4th  rival  interests, 
profiting  by  his  downfall ;  instead  of  his 
brother,  co-operating  with  him,  mutually  help- 
ful and  serviceable  to  each  other.  Hence  the 
struggle  of  injurious  competition,  none  car- 
ing in  his  greed  of  self-advancement  that  his 
neighbor  is  driven  to  the  wall.  Hence  those 
feuds  of  mutually  dependent  classes ;  labor 
and  capital  seeking  each  its  own  advantage, 
and  forcing  hard  terms  upon  the  other,  or 
coming  to  open  rupture  to  the  injury  of  both. 
Hence  discords,  tumults,  wars,  with  all  the 
sorrows  they  occasion  and  the  miseries  they 
entail.  How  would  the  world  blossom  like 
an  Eden,  if  religion  held  full  sway,  and  its 
golden  rule  were  enshrined  in  every  heart  and 
acted  out  in  every  life ! 


JOB  S    HAPPY    ESTATE.  33 

And  religion  is  the  only  salt  which  can 
preserve  from  national  corruption  and  decay. 
The  history  of  the  past  utters  its  warning 
voice,  showing  how  the  downfall  of  nations 
swiftly  follows  on  the  heels  of  national  pros- 
perity, and  the  seeds  of  dissolution  are 
involved  in  the  very  materials  of  their  great- 
ness and  splendor.  Accumulation  multiplies 
the  opportunity  and  the  facilities  of  indul- 
gence, and  public  virtue  gives  way,  amid 
the  glittering  prizes  held  out  for  its  allure- 
ment. Recent  events  have  suggested  gloomy 
thoughts  to  many  reflecting  minds  amongst 
ourselves.  Can  virtue  and  integrity  be  main- 
tained in  our  rulers  and  among  our  people, 
amidst  the  manifold  temptations  which  are 
now  assailing  them,  and  before  which  many 
once  trusted  and  confided  in  have  sadly 
fallen  ?  If  honesty  and  integrity  fail  us  in 
the  centres  of  authority,  if  the  enactment 
and  administration  of  law  can  be  tampered 
with  by  corrupting  influences,  and  the  public 
conscience  becomes  itself  debauched  by  the 
corruption  that  is  coming  in  like  a  flood,  what 


34  JOB  S    HAPPY    ESTATE. 

must  every  sane  mind  anticipate  as  the  inevi- 
table result?  In  this  growing  —  we  fear  it 
must  be  said  rapid  —  decay  of  virtue  and  in- 
tegrity in  legislative  halls,  in  some  quarters 
even  in  courts  of  justice,  and  in  leading  finan- 
cial circles,  the  most  portentous  evils  are 
opening  before  us.  Can  they  be  arrested? 
The  answer  to  this  question  depends  upon 
another.  Have  w^e  vital  Qiristianity  enough 
among  us  to  check  the  progress  of  moral 
decay  ?  Is  there  that  fear  of  God  and  love 
of  truth  and  right  among  our  countrymen, 
which  will  insist  on  honesty  and  integrity  in 
the  administration  of  public  affairs  and  in  the 
conduct  of  moneyed  corporations  and  com- 
mercial enterprises.  The  religion  of  the  gos- 
pel is  the  stronghold  of  our  national  safety  and 
of  the  perpetuity  of  our  institutions.  The 
more  thoroughly  this  gospel  shall  leaven  our 
people,  the  stronger  we  shall  be,  the  firmer 
will  be  the  pillars  of  our  national  prosperity, 
and  the  more  abundant  and  vddely  diffused 
will  be  the  blessings  enjoyed  by  all  our  popu- 
lation. 


JOB  S    HAPPY    ESTATE.  35 

But  the  temporal  blessedness  springing 
from  true  religion  has  its  application  to  indi- 
viduals as  well  as  to  communities  and  masses. 
Communities  are  made  up  of  individuals,  and 
what  tends  to  promote  the  welfare  of  the 
whole  must  in  the  same  ratio  be  conducive  to 
the  good  of  its  -constituent  members.  Upon 
this  there  is  no  need  to  dwell ;  but  there  are 
other  considerations,  which  should  likewise  be 
taken  into  the  account. 

Happiness  is  not  so  dependent  on  exter- 
nal circumstances  as  many  suppose.  It  is  far 
more  powerfully  affected  by  men's  own  char- 
acter and  disposition.  It  lies  not  so  much 
in  the  abundance  of  outward  sources  of  en- 
joyment as  in  the  capacity  to  enjoy.  It  is 
not  graduated  by  wealth,  or  social  position,  or 
success  in  worldly  schemes.  They  who  look 
at  the  bare  outside  of  things  are  often  griev- 
ously mistaken  in  their  judgments.  A  splen- 
did mansion  may  be  the  home  of  misery  and 
care.  And  he  who  reclines  on  the  most  lux- 
urious couch  may  be  a  stranger  to  repose. 
When  we  speak  of  the  blessing  of  God  accom- 


36  job's  happy  estate. 

panying  fidelity  to  His  service,  we  do  not 
mean  that  the  pious  man  will  always  be  rich, 
or  that  he  will  always  attain  distinction,  or  that 
he  will  be  invariably  successful  in  his  worldly 
schemes.  But  we  say  that  while  in  ordinary 
cases  he  will  not  be  damaged,  but  rather  fur- 
thered, even  in  outward  prosperity,  by  his  relig- 
ion, his  real  substantial  happiness  will  be  vastly 
promoted.  He  will  the  better  enjoy  what  he 
does  possess,  he  will  draw  a  livelier  and  purer 
satisfaction  from  it,  than  if  he  had  not  the 
love  of  God  in  his  heart  and  the  fear  of  God 
before .  his  eyes.  If  his  religion  has  simply 
taught  him  this  one  lesson,  in  whatsoever 
state  he  is,  therewith  to  be  content,  it  has 
done  much  to  establish  and  confirm  his  earthly 
happiness.  For  "  godliness  with  contentment 
is  2:reat  gain."  It  frees  him  from  the  dominion 
of  evil  passions,  envy,  jealousy,  hatred,  and 
the  like,  which  are  a  fruitful  source  of  discon- 
tent. It  relieves  him  from  the  galling  slavery 
of  those  in  haste  to  be  rich,  with  its  attendant 
cares,  anxieties,  and  consuming  toil.  It  leads 
him  to  see  in  his  earthly  lot  the  appointment 


JOB  S    HAPPY    ESTATE.  37 

of  his  Heavenly  Father,  and  thus  cures  him 
of  all  restless  endeavors  to  overleap  bounds 
he  cannot  pass.  It  gives  him  the  conscious- 
ness of  being  at  peace  with  his  Maker  and 
with  all  the  world.  He  has  the  joy  which 
flows  from  doing  right ;  and  every  outgoing 
of  unselfish  love,  every  exercise  of  pure  affec- 
tion, every  act  of  generous  kindness  to  the 
necessitous  to  which  his  religion  prompts 
him,  is  a  new  source  of  pleasure.  And  all 
this  is  additional  to  the  delight  of  communion 
with  God,  the  actings  of  his  regenerated  fac- 
ulties, the  enjoyment  w^hich  is  inseparably 
linked  with  the  Christian's  duties  and  privi- 
leges and  his  glorious  hopes,  —  in  fine,  all  that 
is  summed  up  in  that  significant  phrase,  "  the 
joy  of  the  Holy  Ghost,"  a  joy  which  is  often- 
times unspeakable  and  full  of  glory. 

If  any  man  on  earth  should  be  a  happy  man, 
it  is  he  who  is  truly  religious.  Looking 
barely  at  this  present  life,  and  at  the  sources 
of  gratification  which  are  opened  before  us 
here,  the  good  man  is  most  truly  blessed. 
Religion  does  not  foster  gloom :  it  is  the  per- 


38  JOB  S    HAPPY    ESTATE. 

ennial  spring  of  cheerfulness  and  joy.  It 
does  not  abridge  the  enjoyments  of  Hfe :  it 
multiphes  and  heightens  them.  And  there  is 
no  step  that  any  person  can  take,  more  fraught 
with  blessing  to  himself  in  this  world  as  well 
as  in  the  next,  than  that  in  which  he  makes 
choice  of  God  as  his  portion  and  his  friend, 
and  pledges  himself  to  be  His  ever-faitliful 
servant. 


CHAPTER   II. 


Again  there  was  a  day  when  the  sons  of  God  came 
to  present  themselves  before  tJie  Lord,  and  Satan 
came  also  among  tJiem  to  present  himself  before  tJie 
Lord.  —  Job  ii.  i. 


SATAN. 


'Y\7'E  are  now  introduced  to  a  scene  In  the 
invisible  world  of  a  most  impressive 
and  surprising  character.  The  singular  spec- 
tacle is  presented  of  the  Prince  of  Darkness 
appearing  in  the  train  of  the  Most  High.  He 
comes  not  hypocritically  in  the  guise  of  an 
angel  of  light,  but  in  his  proper  character, 
vv^ith  the  rest  of  God's  servants,  to  offer  his 
homage,  to  receive  his  commissions,  to  render 
his  stated  account  of  work  done  and  service 
performed.  This  astonishing  and  unusual 
representation  has  led  some  to  entertain  the 
opinion  that  the  Satan  of  the  book  of  Job 
is  a  different  being  from  the  Satan  of  the 
later  Scriptures.  Else  how  could  he  have  his 
place  among  the  sons  of  God  ?  How  could 
he  come  with  them  at  stated  times  to  present 


42  SATAN. 

himself  before  the  Lord  ?  How  could  this 
be  said  of  the  enemy  of  God  and  the  adver- 
sary of  all  goodness  ?  A  deeper  view  of  this 
passage,  however,  reveals  the  harmony  between 
the  character  in  which  Satan  appears  here 
and  that  which  he  maintains  throughout  the 
rest  of  the  Word  of  God.  He  is  not  a  mere 
spy,  traversing  the  earth  and  intent  upon  fer- 
reting out  all  that  he  can  discover.  He  is 
the  old  spirit  of  malice  and  wickedness, 
aiming  to  pervert  men  from  the  right  ways  of 
the  Lord,  and  to  destroy  all  goodness  as  far 
as  it  is  in  his  power.  And  there  is  a  profound 
meaning  in  his  appearing  here  among  the 
sons  of  God  before  the  Lord.  It  is  designed 
to  express  his  subordination  and  subjection 
to  divine  control.  He  cannot  act  untram- 
melled and  at  his  own  discretion.  He  is  not 
at  liberty  to  pursue  his  mischievous  designs 
to  whatever  extent  he  may  choose.  There  is 
a  superior  restraint  to  which  he  is  obliged  to 
bow,  a  superior  will  that  sets  limits  to  his 
rage,  and  allows  him  even  within  these  limits  to 
act  out  his  evil  nature  only  for  the  sake  of  some 


SATAN.  43 

divine  end,  which  he  is  made  to  be  instru- 
mental in  achieving.^  It  is  evil  in  the  per- 
son of  its  arch-representative  and  head,  subject 
to  good  and  constrained  to  be  its  minister. 
It  is  Satan  actually  exhibited  in  the  attitude 
of  a  servant  of  God,  and  made  subservient  to 
the  discipline  and  training  of  his  people. 

Satan  is  the  enemy  of  goodness  and  the 
enemy  of  man.  With  the  powers  of  an  arch- 
angel, and  with  the  malice  and  subtlety  of  a 
fiend,  he  is  intent  on  our  destruction,  and 
hesitates  at  nothing  by  which  it  can  be  accom- 
plished. He  pursues  his  mischievous  designs 
with  sleepless  vigilance  and  untiring  assiduity. 
Invisible  to  human  eyes,  he  has  all  the  ad- 
vantage of  secrecy,  and  taking  his  victims  at 
unawares.  He  has  his  tools  and  associates 
in  vast  numbers  of  spirits  of  wickedness,  who 
acknowledge  him  as  their  head,  and  are  ani- 
mated with  a  rage  and  cunning  similar  to  his 
own ;  and  in  wicked  men  who  are  led  captive 


*  The  singular  passage,  i  Kings  xxii.  19-22,  aflfords  a  re- 
markable parallel,  whose  figurative  dress  may  perhaps  have 
been  suggested  by  the  symbolical  language  here  employed. 


44  SATAN. 

by  him  at  his  will ;  and  even  in  friendly  hands 
from  whom  no  danger  is  suspected,  and  who 
little  think  themselves  whose  commission  they 
are  unwittingly  fulfilling.  He  has  a  control 
over  external  nature  and  over  the  bodies  of 
men,  which  we  have  no  means  of  estimating, 
but  which  can  only  be  conjectured  from  such 
facts  as  the  disasters  he  brought  upon  Job, 
and  the  maladies  'he  caused  in  the  time  of  our 
Lord.  And,  more  than  all,  he  has  direct  access 
to  our  souls :  he  can  touch  in  some  incom- 
prehensible way  the  springs  of  feeling  and 
conduct,  and  exert  an  influence  over  us,  which 
it  may  well  make  us  shudder  to  think  of. 

All  this  is  terrible.  It  is  a  dreadful  thing 
to  have  a  constant  consciousness  of  danger, 
and  especially  of  unknown  danger ;  to  appre- 
hend that  an  implacable  and  unscrupulous  foe 
is  seeking  your  life,  and  that  he  has  woven 
his  plot  so  stealthily  that  you  know  not  when 
you  are  safe,  nor  whom  to  trust.  But  the 
assassin  can  only  kill  the  body.  Satan  is  a 
murderer  of  souls. 

It  is  an  awful  thing  to  be  exposed  to  his 


SATAN.  45 

treacherous  solicitations.  To  come  under  his 
power  is  perdition.  It  is  to  be  ahenated  from 
God  and  to  incur  the  sentence  of  everlasting 
death.  To  yield  to  him  in  ever  so  slight  a 
deo-ree  is  to  contract  untold  guilt,  to  bring 
ourselves  under  the  displeasure  of  God,  and 
put  our  eternal  all  in  jeopardy.  And  yet 
we  have  no  might  to  stand  up  against  him. 
Surely,  if  there  is  any  petition  that  we  offer 
in  all  sincerity  and  with  agonizing  fervency, 
that  which  our  blessed  Lord  has  taught  us 
should  be  so  offered,  "  Lead  us  not  into  temp- 
tation, but  deliver  us  from  the  evil  one." 

And  yet  these  temptations  cannot  be  es- 
caped. It  may  be  said,  in  a  sense  which  is  in 
no  dano-er  of  beinor  misunderstood,  that  by  an 
ordinance  of  God  they  belong  to  this  present 
state.  Jesus  was  tempted  of  the  devil ;  and 
the  disciple  is  not  above  his  Lord.  The  mem- 
bers must  be  made  like  their  head.  Through 
much  tribulation  we  must  enter  into  the  kmg- 
dom  of  God.  Fightings  and  fears  beset  the 
passage  to  the  crown.  The  peril  is  awful, 
but  success  is  glorious.     "  Blessed  is  the  man 


46  SATAN. 

that  endureth  temptation :  for  when  he  is 
tried,  he  shall  receive  the  crown  of   life." 

Before  entering  strictly  upon  the  develop- 
ment of  the  teachings  of  this  book,  which  is 
the  chief  design  of  this  little  treatise,  we  may- 
be here  permitted  to  devote  a  chapter  to  a  pre- 
liminary inquiry  of  no  small  practical  moment. 
What  is  the  design  of  God  in  subjecting  his 
people  to  this  terrible  ordeal  ?  What  are  the 
disciplinary  ends  of  the  temptations  of  Satan, 
and  how  may  we  best  attain  them  ? 

And  to  this  we  answer :  — 

I.  They  should  drive  us  to  take  refuge  in 
God.  One  grand  aim  of  the  earthly  disci- 
pline of  God's  people,  in  all  its  parts,  is  to 
bring  them  to  a  closer  acquaintance  with  Him 
and  dependence  upon  Him.  They  are  made 
to  learn  more  and  more  of  His  fulness,  and  to 
draw  from  Him  larger  and  richer  supplies. 
All  the  disclosures  of  His  grace  and  of  His 
unbounded  resources  made  in  His  Word  are 
designed  to  brino^  them  to  Himself  as  to  an 
overflowing  fountain,  that  they  may  drink  the 
w^ater  of  life  freely.     But  in  order  that  they 


SATAN.  47 

may  be  stimulated  to  avail  themselves  of  these 
benefits,  and  not  perish  in  sight  of  abundance, 
an  inward  appetite  is  necessary,  a  hungering 
and  thirsting  after  God,  a  craving  for  those 
blessins^s  which  He  has  to  bestow.  And  the 
more  imperative  and  urgent  the  sense  of  need 
which  is  awakened,  the  louder  will  be  the  cry 
for  help,  and  the  more  importunate  the  applica- 
tion for  it. 

Here  precisely  the  temptations  of  the  Evil 
One  have  their  place  in  God's  great  scheme 
of  training.  Every  instinct  of  self-preservation 
in  a  gracious  soul  should  lead  it  to  cry  mightily 
unto  God  for  His  delivering  aid.  Every  temp- 
tation is  attended  with  an  imminence  of  peril, 
which  should  startle  us  out  of  our  security,  and 
lead  us  to  fly  for  safety  to  Him  who  alone  can 
save.  He  who  has  any  just  sense  of  his  own 
weakness  and  frailty,  and  of  the  frightful  evil 
of  sin,  must  be  incessant  in  his  entreaties 
that  he  may  be  upheld  in  steadfastness  by  an 
almighty  arm,  and  guarded  from  the  assaults 
of  one  who  succeeded  even  in  enticing  angels 
to    their   fall,    and    prevailed    over   our   first 

3 


4-8  SATAN. 

parents  in  all  the  vigor  of  their  early  integrity, 
and  to  whom  we  shall  prove  an  easy  prey, 
unless  One,  stronger  than  the  strong  man 
armed,  interferes  for  our  rescue. 

A  proper  sense  of  our  peril  will  not  only 
tend  to  beget  the  general  conviction  that  in 
God  alone  is  our  help,  but  will,  in  addition, 
lead  us  to  fasten  upon  those  particular  assur- 
ances and  grounds  of  encouragement  which 
are  afforded  by  Him  for  just  such  a  crisis  as 
this.  The  knowledge  of  the  vast  power  of 
our  spiritual  adversary  will  lead  us  to  take  ref- 
uge in  the  omnipotence  of  God,  to  place  a 
new  value  upon  this  glorious  attribute,  to 
avail  ourselves  of  it  as  a  basis  of  repose  and 
confidence,  to  make  experience  in  our  daily 
consciousness  of  what  it  is  to  have  a  God  of 
such  infinite  resources  to  supply  our  pressing 
need.  The  almighty  power  of  God  is  then  no 
longer  an  abstraction  to  us,  —  an  intellectual 
conviction,  —  but  a  present  practical  necessity ; 
not  a  perfection  which  we  distantly  contem- 
plate, but  one  by  which  we  live  and  without 
which  we  perish.     The  dire  necessity  which 


SATAN. 


49 


drives  us  to  the  fount  of  life  is,  in  its  results, 
an  incalculable  blessing.  And  the  temptation 
of  Satan,  which  terrifies  the  soul  out  of  all 
self-dependence  and  creature -dependence,  and 
compels  it  to  find  refuge  in  an  almighty  Sav- 
iour, has  accomplished  a  gracious  end. 

And  as  with  this,  so  with  other  perfections 
of  the  ever-blessed  God,  and  with  the  precious 
promises  of  His  Word,  and  with  the  merciful 
provisions  of  the  covenant  of  grace,  and  with 
the  priceless  salvation  of  our  Lord  Jesus 
Christ.  The  tempted  soul  learns  afresh  how 
to  prize  them,  and  embrace  them,  and  cling 
to  them,  and  rest  upon  them,  and  live  by 
them.  To  what  can  he  have  recourse  for  pro- 
tection against  the  subtlety  and  craft  of  Satan 
but  the  infinite  wisdom  and  knowledge  of 
God  ?  How  his  dread  of  the  rage  of  Satan 
enhances  to  him  the  value  of  the  love  of  God ! 
His  unseen  approaches  exalt  in  our  esteem 
God's  gracious  omnipresence.  His  access  to 
our  minds  and  hearts  can  only  be  baffled  or 
rendered  abortive  by  the  indwelling  and  illumi- 
nation of  the  Holy  Ghost.     What  new  delight 


50  SATAN. 

is  awakened  by  the  thought  of  God's  providen- 
tial control,  when  we  remember  that  He  who 
has  set  the  seas  their  bound  restrains  like- 
wise the  malice  of  Satan,  suffers  him  not  to 
overstep  the  limits  which  our  Father's  love 
has  fixed,  and  will  not  allow  His  people  to  be 
tempted  above  that  they  are  able  to  bear,  or 
without  providing  a  way  of  escape  for  them 
that  they  be  not  overcome  thereby!  And 
w^hat  completeness  is  imparted  to  Christ's 
redemption,  when  we  see  that  He  triumphed 
over  Satan,  bruised  the  serpent  in  the  dust, 
and  shall  bruise  him  under  His  people's  feet! 
With  what  new  eagerness  will  these  dreaded 
temptations  compel  us  to  look  to  the  cross, 
which  is  the  symbol  and  pledge  of  victory 
over  the  destroyer ! 

2.  The  temptations  of  Satan  answer  the 
important  purpose  of  training  the  believer  in 
the  duties  and  exercises  of  the  Christian  war- 
fare. The  sacred  historian  informs  us  that 
there  was  a  providential  design  in  leaving 
a  remnant  of  the  Canaanites  in  the  land  of 
Israel,  viz.,  to  teach  succeeding  generations 


SATAN.  5 1 

of  the  people  war.  There  is  no  teacher  Hke 
necessity,  and  no  training  in  the  miUtary  art 
comparable  to  that  enforced  by  actual  hos- 
tilities. 

What  emphasis  there  is  in  that  direction  of 
the  apostle,  "  Put  on  the  whole  armor  of  God, 
that  ye  may  be  able  to  stand  against  the  wiles 
of  the  devil  " !  It  is  not  a  time  of  peace  and 
security,  but  of  deadly  conflict.  It  will  not 
do  to  remain  defenceless,  and  no  armor  that 
is  defective  or  incomplete  will  answer  in  this 
terrible  exigency.  The  weapons  of  our  adver- 
sary will  be  swift  to  find  it,  if  there  be  one 
weak  or  unguarded  spot  from  head  to  foot. 
And  what  a  school  for  practice  in  all  the 
measures  of  offence  and  defence  is  this  con- 
test for  life  or  death  with  such  a  foe !  It  is 
said  of  a  great  master  in  the  art  of  war,  that 
he  learned  his  skill  in  strategy  entirely  from 
the  powerful  and  able  leaders  with  w4iom  he 
was  obliged  to  cope.  The  Christian,  in  his 
protracted  and  stubborn  contest  with  the 
wiliest  of  all  antagonists,  cannot  fail  to  make 
distinguished  progress  in  spiritual  generalship, 


5  2  SATAN. 

as  well  as  to  develop  the  qualities  of  a  good 
soldier  of  Jesus  Christ. 

Nothing  is  better  adapted  to  call  forth  a 
manly  vigor  than  the  necessity  of  strenuous 
exertion.  The  struggles  one  must  make,  the 
endeavors  one  must  put  forth  to  resist  temp- 
tation and  to  overcome  the  evil  one,  react 
to  the  greatest  advantage  upon  Christian 
character.  The  circumspection  necessary  to 
escape  his  insidious  designs,  the  vigilance  of 
one  who  is  obliged  to  be  ever  on  his  guard, 
the  fixed  determination  of  one  who  has  set 
his  face  like  a  flint  for  the  celestial  city,  and 
who  has  resolved  that  he  will  be  true  to  his 
God  and  his  Saviour  at  all  hazards,  tend  to 
elevate  rapidly  the  standard  of  the  inner  life. 

And  these  temptations  exhibit  grace  as 
well  as  develop  it.  It  can  never  be  shown 
either  to  himself  or  to  others  what  a  man  is 
until  he  is  tried.  The  constancy  of  Job  and 
the  power  of  his  faith  could  never  have  been 
made  to  appear  so  conspicuous,  if  it  had  not 
been  for  the  severity  of  the  test  to  which  he 
was    subjected.      This    lay  not    only   in    the 


SATAN.  53 

accumulated  sorrows  by  which  he  was  so  sud- 
denly overwhelmed,  but  chiefly  in  the  sug- 
gestions of  the  tempter,  who  was  mercilessly 
goading  him  on  to  give  up  his  confidence  in 
God,  and  to  renounce  His  service.  It  was  these 
sore  temptations,  based  on  the  mystery  of  dis- 
pensations w^iich  he  could  not  unravel,  and 
backed  by  a  logic  which  he  knew  not  how  to 
confute,  which  tortured  him  almost  to  despair, 
and  wrung  from  him  those  bitter  wailings 
with  which  the  book  abounds.  And  yet  in 
spite  of  all,  out  of  the  midst  of  the  depths  we 
hear  him  utter  in  the  very  face  of  the  tempter 
his  unabated  trust  in  God,  "  I  know  that  my 
Redeemer  liveth." 

3.  The  temptations  of  Satan,  if  properly 
met,  may  be  made  a  means  of  intensifying 
our  hatred  of  sin.  He  who  has  barely  es- 
caped the  fangs  of  a  venomous  reptile  will 
ever  after  entertain  a  deeper  abhorrence  of  it. 
Sin  is  in  every  temptation  offered  to  our 
choice.  But  it  need  only  be  stripped  of  its 
disguises  to  present  it  in  its  repulsive  and 
odious   features,  and    make    us    shrink   with 


54  SATAN. 

loathing  from  the  contact.  The  veiy  act  of 
repelHng  it  will  cultivate  a  spiritual  sensitive- 
ness which  can  less  and  less  endure  its  hate- 
ful presence. 

But,  in  the  fourth  place,  observe  that  temp- 
tation may  be  an  aid  to  self-knowledge.  The 
germs  of  evil  often  lie  undeveloped  in  the 
heart,  and  the  man  himself  never  suspects 
their  existence  until  under  the  influence  of 
some  sudden  or  strong  temptation  they  are 
brought  to  light.  It  is  like  the  searching  tests 
of  the  assayer  exposing  the  presence  of  alloy 
in  what  might  easily  have  passed  for  sterling 
metal.  Such  mortification  enters  into  the 
Christian's  daily  experience,  humiliating  dis- 
coveries of  the  strength  of  latent  corruption 
and  unsubdued  propensities  to  evil,  appetites 
which  he  supposed  he  had  under  subjection 
resuming  the  mastery  in  some  fatal  moment, 
the  feebleness  of  his  resolutions,  insincerity 
in  motives,  imperfection  in  his  best  sei*vices. 
If  these  discoveries  serve  to  humble  him  in 
the  dust,  and  bring  him  in  penitent  broken- 
ness  of   heart  to  sue  for   pardoning   mercy, 


SATAN.  55 

and  lead  him  to  be  more  watchful  against  his 
besetting  sins,  the  ends  of  divine  grace  in 
suffering  him  to  be  overtaken  by  this  tempta- 
tion will  be  answered. 

It  was  thus  with  Job.  God  himself  testified 
that  there  was  none  like  him  in  the  earth, 
a  perfect  and  an  upright  man,  that  feared  God, 
and  eschewed  evil.  And  yet  there  was  a 
leaven  of  corruption  in  his  imperfectly  sancti- 
fied nature,  of  which  he  was  not  aware,  until 
by  the  terrible  thrusts  of  Satan  it  was  exposed. 
Underneath  his  really  sincere  and  fervent  piety 
there  was  a  taint  of  self -righteousness,  which 
made  him  smart  as  he  did  under  the  reproaches 
of  his  friends,  and  which,  in  the  awful  darkness 
of  that  mysterious  dispensation  in  which  he 
was  enshrouded,  led  him  even  to  the  length  of 
justifying  himself  rather  than  God.  Brought 
at  last  to  himself,  and  dismayed  at  the  thought 
of  what  he  had  allowed  himself  to  utter,  he 
says,  "  I  abhor  myself,  and  repent  in  dust  and 
ashes."  The  desio;n  of  God  in  this  severe  but 
salutary  discipline  was  accomplished.  Job  had 
been  led  to  know  himself  better  than  he  did 

3* 


56  SATAN. 


t 


before,  and  he  was  humbled  by  this  knowledge. 
The  evil  which  before  lurked  within  him  un- 
suspected was  detected  and  renounced. 

5.  The  temptations  of  Satan  afford  the  occa- 
sion to  grace  to  develop  itself  in  forms  which 
otherwise  it  could  not  assume.  Thus  all  that 
is  implied  in  patient  continuance  in  well-doing 
could  have  no  place  under  other  circumstances 
than  those  in  which  we  are.  The  blessed  in- 
habitants of  that  upper  sphere,  where  sin  and 
sorrow  never  enter,  know  not  what  it  is  to  drag 
for  ever  after  them  this  body  of  corruption,  to 
be  checked  and  hampered  in  all  their  aspira- 
tions by  a  law  of  sin  in  their  members,  to 
maintain  their  steadfastness  amid  surrounding 
foes,  to  preserve  the  flame  of  piety  bright  and 
clear  under  the  deadening  influences  of  this 
ungodly  world,  to  keep  a  cheerful  hope  in  the 
midst  of  discouragement  and  ill  success,  and 
doubts  and  fears ;  or  to  continue  to  trust  un- 
waveringly in  the  Lord,  when  deprived  of  the 
light  of  His  countenance.  Now,  however  God 
may  be  glorified  and  His  law  honored  by  the 
unhesitating  obedience  rendered  by  the  count- 


SATAN.  57 

less  ranks  of  those  who  do  not  understand 
from  their  own  experience  what  temptation 
means,  it  would  appear  as  though  there  was 
something  yet  more  signal  and  illustrious  in 
that  willing  obedience  which  costs  many  a  weary 
effort  and  many  a  painful  struggle, —  in  that  loy- 
alty to  Jesus  which  is  maintained  not  amidst 
the  sympath)^  and  applause  of  those  who 
likewise  adore  His  name,  but  in  the  face  of 
derision,  obloquy,  and  persecution ;  in  that  un- 
faltering submission,  which  can  say  not  merely 
in  the  sunlight  of  the  throne,  but  in  the  bowl- 
ings of  the  pitiless  tempest,  "  Thy  will  be 
done."  The  post  of  danger  is  the  post  of 
honor,  if  it  be  well  and  bravely  defended.  Is 
it  no  honor,  then,  which  the  Lord  of  all  puts 
upon  faithful  souls  when  He  sets  them  in  the 
fore-front  of  the  battle,  where  the  fiery  darts  of 
the  adversary  shower  thickly  around  them, 
and  bids  them  stand  firmly  there,  and  bravely 
maintain  His  cause.?  Might  not  angels  envy 
them  this  exalted  privilege.? 

And  then,  besides,  there  are  forms  of  pious 
service  which  are  conditioned  by  the  tempta- 


58  SATAN. 

tlons  of  Satan  directed  not  upon  the  actors 
themselves,  but  upon  others,  —  those  holy 
Christlike  ministrations  to  the  sinful  and  the 
suffering,  the  ignorant  and  the  needy,  —  those 
beautiful  acts  of  heaven-born  charity  which  so 
illustrate  and  adorn  the  gospel,  and  shed  a  fra- 
grance so  pleasing  both  to  God  and  man,  — 
all  this  belongs  to  a  world  where  sin  abounds, 
and  Satan  has  free  scope,  and  can  appear 
nowhere  else. 

A  sixth  gracious  end,  w^hich  temptations 
may  be  designed  to  accomplish,  is  to  wean  the 
heart  from  the  love  of  this  present  world.  It 
is  sheer  cowardice  or  faint-heartedness  in  a 
soldier  to  be  for  ever  whining  about  the  dan- 
gers or  hardships  of  the  campaign,  and  im- 
portuning for  a  release.  And  it  would  be 
reprehensible  in  the  Christian  to  be  indolently 
sighing  for  the  coming  rest,  merely  to  escape 
the  toil  of  laboring  in  his  Masters  service. 
But  this  error  is  far  less  common  than  the 
opposite  extreme  of  clinging  unduly  to  this 
vain  world,  and  having  the  affections  too  firmly 
rooted  here.     To  counteract  this  dangerous 


SATAN.  59 

tendency,  measures  must  be  employed  to 
loosen  this  attachment,  by  making  the  world 
seem  less  desirable,  and  causing  us  to  sigh  for 
what  is  purer  and  better.  The  weariness  in- 
duced by  the  incessant  conflict  between  the 
flesh  and  the  spirit  often  weighs  heavily  upon 
the  soul.  It  is  a  hard  thing  to  be  for  ever 
crucifying  our  corrupt  nature,  to  be  always 
struggling  against  a  power  which  we  find  it 
impossible  to  subdue,  endeavoring  to  keep 
down  principles  and  propensities  which  we 
strive  in  vain  to  eradicate  or  extinguish,  and 
never  able  with  safety  to  relax  our  vigilance  or 
to  desist  from  effort.  And  it  is  disheartening 
to  find  how  slow  is  our  progress  towards  the 
completed  conquest,  even  if  we  advance  at 
all ;  how  often  the  ground  which  we  seemed 
to  have  won  is  wrested  from  us,  and  foes  that 
w^e  thouorht  slain  rise  ao^ain  to  their  feet 
as  powerful  as  before.  All  this,  though  it 
should  not  lead  us  to  abandon  the  fight  while 
the  enemy  is  still  in  the  field,  would  make  the 
news  of  victory  more  welcome.  It  gives  sweet- 
ness to  the  thought  of  a  world  where  there 


6o  SATAN. 

shall  be  no  more  sin,  and  into  which  temp- 
tation cannot  enter,  where  inbred  lusts  and 
native  corruption  shall  be  removed  for  ever, 
and  Satan  shall  at  length  have  ceased 
to  annoy.  And  this  suggests  the  farther 
thought :  — 

7.  That  the  future  glory  shall  be  heightened 
by  the  temptations  of  this  present  time,  which 
have  been  bravely  met  and  successfully  re- 
sisted. It  is  not  merely  that  the  coming  bless- 
edness shall  be  an  ample  compensation  for  all 
that  tempted  souls  can  now  endure,  that  the 
flood  of  joy  shall  swallow  up  all  thought  of  pres- 
ent pains,  and  the  light  affliction,  which  is  for 
a  moment,  shall  be  followed  by  a  far  more  ex- 
ceeding and  eternal  weight  of  glory.  But  this 
glory  shall,  in  various  ways,  be  directly  en- 
hanced by  those  temptations,  in  so  far  as  they 
have  not  been  criminally  yielded  to,  but  in  the 
name  of  the  Master  stoutly  repelled.  And  thus 
what  Satan  intended  for  your  hurt  shall  be 
converted  into  a  source  of  everlasting  profit. 
The  experience  of  rest  shall  be  heightened 
by  the  contrast  of   the  antecedent   toil    and 


SATAN.  6 1 

strife ;  and  the  felicity  granted  to  the  ran- 
somed soul  shall  be  likewise  enhanced  in  its 
absolute  amount.  If  the  reward,  though 
wholly  the  gift  of  grace,  is  in  proportion  to 
the  service  done  or  the  fidelity  shown,  duty 
resolutely  performed  in  the  face  of  tempta- 
tions of  the  evil  one  will  surely  receive  a 
marked  and  signal  acknowledgment.  The 
training  given  to  the  spiritual  faculties  in  the 
exercises  of  the  Christian  warfare,  the  devel- 
opment and  expansion  thence  resulting  to 
the  powers  of  the  soul,  bear  directly  on  our 
capacity  for  bliss  and  holiness.  They  who 
have  attained  the  highest  measure  of  fitness 
thus  for  the  enjoyments  of  heaven  shall  have 
the  largest  experience  of  its  blessedness.  And, 
further,  those  who  have  been  driven  by  the 
assaults  of  the  adversary  into  the  closest 
union  with  their  covenant  God,  and  the  most 
entire  dependence  upon  Him,  shall  for  this 
reason  again  partake  most  freely  of  those  joys 
which  flow  from  endless  communion  with  the 
infinite  source  of  all  blessedness. 

8.  And   lastly    the    temptations  of    Satan 


62  SATAN. 

redound  to  the  glory  of  divine  grace.  It 
belongs  to  the  magnificence  of  God's  uni- 
versal government  that  opposition  and  hos- 
tility, to  whatever  degree  and  from  whatever 
quarter,  instead  of  tending  to  thwart  or  retard 
His  plans,  invariably  contribute  to  further  and 
promote  them.  Satan  forms  no  exception. 
This  arch-fiend,  with  all  his  legions  and  the 
entire  kingdom  of  evil  which  he  instigates 
and  controls,  in  spite  of  their  gathered  forces 
and  formidable  numbers,  and  subtle  craft  and 
hellish  spite,  is  absolutely  powerless  to  prevent 
or  to  retard  the  execution  of  the  least  of  God's 
designs.  An  infant  in  the  arms  is  not  more 
impotent  to  arrest  the  movement  of  the 
spheres  than  Satan  is  to  check  the  fulfilment 
of   God's  sovereign  decrees. 

And  this  absolute  control  is  rendered  more 
illustrious  by  the  manner  of  its  exercise.  It 
is  not  by  bringing  the  resources  of  omnipo- 
tence to  overpower  the  devil  and  his  crew, 
and  to  chain  them  in  the  awful  prison-house 
prepared  for  them,  so  that,  driven  entirely 
away  from  the  theatre  of  His  operations,  they 


SATAN.  63 

can  no  longer  interfere  with  or  obstruct 
them.  On  the  contrary,  Satan  is  allowed  free 
range,  as  the  prince  of  the  power  of  the  air. 
He  has  installed  himself  as  the  god  of  this 
world.  He  is  busy  with  his  plans  and  his 
combinations.  They  are  laid  with  consum- 
mate skill,  and  he  is  working  them  with  tre- 
mendous energy.  He  is  laboring  to  undo 
the  work  of  God,  to  defeat  the  atonement,  to 
destroy  souls  whom  Christ  would  save.  But 
his  machinations  shall  recoil  upon  himself. 
Do  what  he  may,  let  him  rage  as  he  please, 
let  him  accomplish  his  worst,  and  he  is  after 
all  only  building  up  what  in  his  blind  fury  and 
malice  he  is  endeavoring  to  tear  down.  The 
decrees  which  he  would  frustrate  embrace 
himself  and  all  his  hateful  deeds,  as  agencies 
co-operating  to  their  fulfilment.  With  all  his 
hatred  of  God  and  spite  against  His  people, 
he  cannot  emancipate  himself  from  that  sov- 
ereign control,  which  binds  him  to  God's  ser- 
vice. In  all  his  blasphemous  designs  he  is,  in 
spite  of  himself,  doing  the  work  of  God.  In 
liis  rebellious  efforts  to  dethrone  the   Most 


64  SATAN. 

High,  he  Is  actually  paying  Him  submissive 
homao^e.  In  movinor  heaven  and  earth  to 
accomplish  the  perdition  of  those  whom 
Christ  has  ransomed,  he  is  actually  fitting 
them  for  glory.  Fiend  as  he  is,  full  of  bitter- 
ness and  malignity,  and  intent  on  every  form 
of  mischief,  he  is  constrained  to  be  that  which 
he  most  abhors,  and  is  f urthest ,  f rom  his  in- 
tentions and  desires,  helpful  and  auxiliary  to 
the  designs  of  grace.  Like  the  sons  of  God 
who  assemble  in  the  presence  of  the  Infinite 
Majesty  to  receive  the  commissions  of  the 
King  of  kings,  prompt  to  do  His  bidding  and 
to  execute  His  will,  Satan  is,  though  most  re- 
luctantly, and  in  a  different  sense  from  them, 
yet  as  really  and  as  truly,  in  the  case  of  those 
who,  like  Job,  steadfastly  resist  his  insidious 
assaults,  a  ministering  spirit  sent  forth  to 
minister  to  them  who  shall  be  heirs  of  sal- 
vation. 

But  the  enforced  subordination  of  this 
spirit  of  malice  and  wickedness  to  the  ends 
of  divine  mercy  and  grace  Is  rendered  yet 
more  illustrious,  both  to  the  praise  of  God's 


SATAN.  ^65 

glory  and  to  Satan's  everlasting  shame  and 
crushing  defeat  by  another  particular  in  the 
achievement  of  this  triumph.  This  is  the 
immediate  agency  by  which  his  subjugation 
is  effected.  The  New  Testament  seer  beheld 
a  vision  of  war  in  heaven.  Michael  and  his 
angels  fought  against  the  dragon.;  and  the 
dragon  fought,  and  his  angels,  and  prevailed 
not.  Neither  was  their  place  found  any  more 
in  heaven.  And  the  great  dragon  was  cast 
out,  and  his  angels  were  cast  out  with  him. 
Here,  though  he  was  defeated,  it  was  by  an 
antagonist  worthy  to  cope  with  him.  The 
rival  forces  fairly  matched  his  own  ;  and,  how- 
ever disastrous  his  overthrow,  there  was  no 
dishonor  in  falling  by  such  hands. 

But  when,  smarting  under  his  defeat  in 
heaven,  he  went  to  make  war  with  them 
which  keep  the  commandments  of  God,  and 
have  the  testimony  of  Jesus  Christ,  he  pre- 
pared for  himself  a  most  ignominious  repulse. 
He  who  aspired  to  be  the  leader  of  the  host 
of  heaven,  and  drew  a  third  part  of  the  angels 
in  his  fall,  assaults  the  feeble  children  of  men, 


66  SATAN. 

and  utterly  fails  to  compass  the  ruin  of  one 
of  them  upon  whom  Jesus  has  set  his  love. 
He  can  terrify  them  ;  he  can  torture  them  ; 
he  can  make  them  drag  on  the  weary  conflict 
with  sin  and  corruption  while  life  lasts ;  he 
can  extort  from  them  bitter  groans  of  agoniz- 
ing distress ;  he  can  shower  upon  them  his 
fiery  darts ;  but  he  cannot  destroy  them. 
The  glimmering  spark,  which  divine  grace 
has  kindled,  he  cannot  with  all  the  floods 
of  temptation  extinguish.  Satan  cannot  by 
any  means  harm  the  feeblest  of  God's 
saints,  who  stands  up  against  him  in  the 
name  of  the  Lord.  If  he  have  on  the  armor 
with  which  divine  grace  has  furnished  him, 
and  use  aright  the  weapons  with  which  he  is 
supplied,  and  in  humble  dependence  on  his 
Lord  abides  faithful  at  his  post,  he  is  invin- 
cible ;  and  the  boastful  foe,  who  came  upon 
him  ready  to  swallow  him  up,  shall  be  driven 
back  in  shame  and  confusion.  Resist  the 
devil,  and  he  will  flee  from  you. 

In  the  rapid  view  which  has  been  taken  of 
this  subject,  our  attention  has  been  confined 


SATAN.  67 

to  the  temptations  of  Satan,  as  directed 
against  the  individual  behever.  Our  limits 
will  not  allow  us  to  extend  our  view  to  his 
assaults  upon  the  kingdom  of  God  in  its 
collective  capacity,  and  see  how  there,  too,  he 
most  unwittingly  acts  under  orders  from  the 
throne ;  how,  in  stirring  up  opposers  to  com- 
bat the  truth  of  God,  he  but  contributes  to 
clear  its  statements,  to  unfold  its  richness, 
and  render  its  defences  more  impregnable ; 
how  all  his  designs  upon  the  Church,  whether 
in  provoking  against  her  the  hostility  of  the 
world,  sowing  dissensions  in  her  own  ranks, 
or  in  whatever  way  he  may  endeavor  her 
injury,  are  unable  to  effect  her  overthrow. 
The  gates  of  hell  cannot  prevail  against  the 
Church.  The  earthquake,  which  in  its  violent 
upheaval  threatens  to  demolish  the  city  of 
God,  but  shows  how  absolutely  secure  its  firm 
foundations  are.  He  may  shake  earth  and 
heaven,  and  the  crash  will  only  bring  down 
what  he  had  himself  essayed  to  build  with  rude 
untempered  mortar,  and  it  will  only  reveal  in 


68  SATAN. 

its  unique  stability,  and  bring  to  view  in  its 
fair  proportions,  free  from  every  disfiguring 
addition,  the  solid,  immovable  building  of 
God. 

And  now  in  this  warfare  we  are  engaged. 
The  temptations  of  Satan  are  not  to  be 
escaped:  no  sheltered  position,  no  seclusion 
from  the  world,  no  sacredness  of  occupation, 
can  screen  us  from  them.  The  only  question 
is.  Shall  they  prove  our  infinite  damage,  or 
shall  they  be  made  to  recoil  harmless  and 
pointless?  It  is  the  most  awful  question 
which  we  can  be  summoned  to  answer ; 
and  yet  the  decision  of  this  question  may  be 
said  to  have  been  placed  by  the  infinite  grace 
of  God  within  our  own  control.  If  you  yield 
to  the  tempter,  you  become  his  helpless  prey. 
If  you  steadfastly  resist  him,  confiding  in  the 
grace  of  God  and  the  salvation  of  Jesus,  he 
cannot  touch  a  hair  of  your  head.  Tempta- 
tion and  sin,  if  you  bravely  resist  them,  will 
react  to  your  everlasting  w^elfare  :  your 
position    is    impregnable,    the   protection    is 


SATAN.  69 

ample,  the  armament  is  invincible,  the  sup- 
plies abundant,  and  the  fortress  can  never 
be  entered  by  the  enemy,  unless  betrayed 
into  his  power  by  your  own  treacherous 
hands. 


CHAPTER   III. 


The  Lord  gave,  and  the  Lord  hath  takeji  away  ; 
blessed  be  the  name  of  the  Lord.  —  Job  i.  21. 

Shall  zve  receive  good  at  the  hand  of  Gody  and 
shall  we  not  receive  evil?  —  Job  ii.   10. 


JOB    IN   AFFLICTION. 


"V^yE  have  seen  Job  in  his  piety  and  pros- 
perous estate.  We  are  now  to  see  him 
in  his  sad  reverses,  and  to  witness  his  behav- 
ior in  affliction.  A  change  of  circumstances 
often  makes  a  great  change  in  men  themselves, 
or  at  least  exposes  a  new  and  previously 
unsuspected  side  of  their  character,  and  de- 
velops unlooked-for  results.  Sometimes  it 
brings  to  light  defects  that  had  never  been 
dreamed  of  in  those  who  were  esteemed 
almost  faultless  ;  sometimes  it  reveals  unan- 
ticipated excellencies.  Emergencies  are  the 
making  of  some  men,  and  the  destruction  of 
others.  The  former  rise  in  greatness,  and  in 
every  noble  quality  of  soul,  in  proportion  to 
the  increasing  demands  of  the  occasion.    The 


74  JOB    IN    AFFLICTION. 

latter  are  unable  to  abide  the  severity  of  the 
test  applied  to  them,  and  fall  before  it.  How 
will  it  be  with  Job  ? 

A  disclosure  is  made  at  the  outset,  to  the 
readers  of  this  book,  of  things  that  are  con- 
cealed from  the  human  actors  in  it.  The  veil 
that  hides  the  unseen  world  is  partially  drawn 
aside,  so  as  to  afford  us  a  glimpse  of  a  spirit- 
ual agent,  who  is  to  give  a  new  turn  to  events. 
The  arch-enemy  of  man  has  had  his  eye  upon 
Job.  True  to  the  instincts  of  his  own  vile 
nature,  he  has  no  faith  in  the  reality  of  good- 
ness. He  sees  in  the  piety  of  Job  nothing 
but  a  refined  form  of  selfishness.  He  serves 
God  because  it  is  his  interest  to  do  so.  God 
protects  and  blesses  him,  and  as  a  matter  of 
course  he  inclines  to  the  quarter  from  which 
the  favors  come ;  but  if  these  favors  were 
to  cease,  the  tempter  urges,  Job's  piety  would 
vanish  with  them.  His  goodness  has  its 
spring  in  its  attendant  rewards  :  withhold  the 
latter,  and  Job  will  soon  take  leave  of  God 
and  His  service,  which  no  longer  yields  him 
any  advantage. 


JOB    IN    AFFLICTION.  75 

Satan  is  allowed  to  bring  to  an  issue  this 
question  which  he  has  raised.  He  may  put 
Job's  piety  to  the  test,  and  in  him  he  may  test 
the  question  whether  there  is  such  a  thing 
as  real  piety  in  the  earth,  a  piety  that  is  not 
merely  self-seeking  and  actuated  by  a  hope  of 
gain,  but  which  heartily  loves  the  right  and 
cleaves  to  it,  and  chooses  the  service  of  God 
though  no  hope  of  profit  can  attach  to  so  doing. 
Job  is  on  trial,  though  he  knows  it  not ;  and 
unfriendly  eyes  are  eagerly  watching  for  his 
halting.  And  he  is  on  trial  not  merely  for 
himself:  the  cause  of  religion  is  represented 
in  him,  the  cause  of  God  on  earth,  though 
he  is  also  unconscious  of  the  dignity  of  his 
position  and  of  the  sacredness  of  the  interest 
which  he  is  set  to  sustain,  and  of  the  fact 
that  the  eyes  ol  the  Lord  of  all  are  turned 
upon  him  with  approval,  and  with  a  lively 
concern  for  the  favorable  issue  of  the  strug- 
gle in  which  he  is  engaged.  Of  the  spiritual 
significance  of  this  transaction,  Job  is  pro- 
foundly ignorant.  He  feels  the  terrible  pres- 
sure of  his  heavy  sorrows,  but  he  is  not  aware 


76  JOB    IN    AFFLICTION. 

that  they  have  been  sent  upon  him  as  a  test 
of  character.  He  knows  nothing  of  Satan's 
mahcious  designs,  who  seeks  to  prove  his 
piety  a  pretence.  He  knows  nothing  of  the 
sovereign  purpose  of  God,  who  means  to  es- 
tabHsh  its  reahty  and  power  to  the  confusion 
of  the  tempter. 

It  is  with  trembhng  apprehension  that  we 
see  such  power  granted  to  this  unseen  adver- 
sary, with  Hberty  to  use  it  against  the  unsus- 
pecting patriarch :  "  Behold,  all  that  he  hath  is 
in  thy  power."  "  Behold,  he  is  in  thine  hand." 
The  contest  seems  fearfully  unequal  between 
this  arch-fiend  and  mortal  man,  however  firm 
his  integrity,  whatever  the  sincerity  and 
strength  of  his  piety.  It  reassures  us  some- 
what, however,  when  we  observe  that  the 
tempter  is,  after  all,  limited  and  restrained  by 
Job's  almighty  Guardian  and  Friend.  The 
fiend  cannot  frame  and  carry  out  his  malevo- 
lent designs  unchecked.  He  acts  only  by  suf- 
ferance. He  must  have  leave  from  the  Most 
High,  before  he  can  touch  Job  at  all  to  harm 
him  or  lay  his  hand  upon  any  thing  that  he 


JOB    IN    AFFLICTION.  "J^ 

has.  And,  when  permission  is  given,  it  is 
within  fixed  Hmits,  which  he  may  not  over- 
step. When  Job's  property  was  put  at  Satan's 
disposal,  it  was  with  the  accompanying  restric- 
tion :  "  Only  upon  himself  put  not  forth  thine' 
hand."  When  Job's  own  person  was  further 
subjected  to  his  power,  it  was  with  the  added 
requirement,  "  But  save  his  life."  With  all 
the  limitations,  however,  a  tremendous  range 
was  conceded  to  this  enemy  of  all  right- 
eousness, and  the  assault  which  he  makes 
is  a  frightful  one.  Can  Job  endure  the 
shock  ? 

In  order  that  we  may  properly  appreciate 
the  conduct  of  Job  in  his  afHiction,  we  must 
further  take  into  account  another  considera- 
tion. Job  went  into  his  trial  destitute  of 
many  of  those  firm  supports  and  grounds  of 
consolation,  which  are  now  so  plentifully  sup- 
plied to  suffering  saints.  Those  revelations 
had  not  yet  been  made,  upon  which  the  be- 
liever now  so  firmly  rests  his  hope  in  times 
of  deep  distress.  Truths,  which  are  as  famil- 
iar   to    us    as    household    words   in  the  gra- 


78  JOB    IN    AFFLICTION. 

cious  disclosures  of  the  gospel,  had  never  yet 
been  clearly  set  before  the  minds  of  men. 
Perhaps  it  may  be  said  that  the  faintest  con- 
ceptions of  them  had  scarcely  dawned  on 
any  human  consciousness.  The  king's  broad 
highway  through  the  wilderness  of  earthly 
sorrow,  along  which  suffering  pilgrims  can 
now  pass  in  comparative  safety  and  comfort, 
had  not  then  been  constructed.  Its  route 
had  not  even  been  surveyed,  nor  a  pathway 
broken.  Job  was  one  of  the  hardy  pioneers 
to  whom  this  primary  task  was  committed. 
He  had  to  make  his  own  way,  without  guide 
or  chart  or  knowledge  of  the  ground,  through 
the  tangled,  trackless,  howling  waste ;  with 
no  licyht  to  relieve  the  darkness  of  the  niofht 
that  enveloped  him  but  the  lone  pole-star  of  his 
unshaken  trust  in  God,  and  this,  alas  !  dimmed 
often,  and  obscured  by  the  black,  threatening 
clouds  which  swept  athwart  his  sky,  though 
ever  and  anon  peering  forth  afresh ;  unshel- 
tered, too,  from  the  tempest  and  the  storm, 
which  broke  over  him  without  mercy.  Prec- 
ipices yawned  at  his  feet,  swollen   streams 


JOB    IN    AFFLICTION.  79 

ran  across  his  route,  and  there  were  treacher- 
ous bogs  in  which  he  might  be  hopelessly 
mired.  Is  it  strange  if  his  stout  heart  quailed 
at  the  terrors  which  surrounded  him  ?  Is  it 
strange  if  groans  of  distress  were  extorted 
from  him  ?  Yet,  in  spite  of  all,  he  pushed 
his  way  through,  and  the  path  which  he 
opened  has  defined  the  route  for  many  trav- 
ellers since.  There  is  not  a  weary  sufferer 
in  Christendom  who  is  not  indebted  to  the 
patriarch  of  Uz,  who  has  not  been  helped 
and  aided  by  his  example  of  fortitude  and 
constancy,  and  in  addition  had  reason  to  be 
grateful  for  the  lessons  of  comfort  and  hope 
transmitted  to  us  from  him.  He  grappled 
with  the  mystery  of  affliction  in  all  its  unex- 
plained darkness  and  difficulty,  until  his  own 
soul  found  rest.  Those  cheering  views  of 
truth,  to  which  he  fought  his  way,  or  which 
were  graciously  vouchsafed  to  him  in  his  trial, 
have  been  the  heritage  of  God's  people  ever 
since. 

Think  for  a  moment  what  it  would  be  to 
encounter  crushing  sorrows  not  only  without 

4* 


8o  JOB    IN    AFFLICTION. 

Calvary  and  Gethsemane  and  the  sympathy 
of  the  incarnate  Son  of  God,  who  is  Himself 
touched  with  the  feeling  of  our  infirmities,  for 
He  was  in  all  points  tempted  like  as  we  are, 
yet  without  sin ;  but  to  go  into  trials  that 
offer  no  bright  spot  this  side  the  grave,  with 
no  clear  views  of  that  eternal  blessedness,  in 
comparison  with  which  all  earthly  sorrows, 
however  grievous  in  themselves,  and  long 
continued,  are  nevertheless  light  and  momen- 
tary; without  the  assurance  that  present 
griefs  and  sufferings  shall  be  overbalanced 
and  outweighed  by  that  far  more  exceeding 
and  eternal  weight  of  glory,  whose  absolute 
amount  they  shall  themselves  greatly  enhance. 
What  would  it  be  to  encounter  frowning 
providences  without  the  distinct  understand- 
ing that  these  are  nevertheless  consistent  with 
the  abiding,  unchanging  love  of  our  heavenly 
Father?  They  are  not  tokens  of  His  dis- 
pleasure ;  they  are  not  evidences  that  He  has 
withdrawn  His  love  or  has  shut  up  His  tender 
mercies.  On  the  contrary,  whom  the  Lord 
loveth  He  chasteneth.     There  is  a  paternal 


JOB    IN    AFFLICTION.  8 1 

discipline  in  affliction.  It  has  a  gracious 
design,  and  will  have  a  salutary  result.  The 
rod  is  in  a  loving  Father's  hand :  its  strokes 
are  not  capriciously  nor  unkindly  given,  they 
are  administered  solely  for  our  good. 

Deprive  the  sufferer  of  the  solace  afforded 
by  his  knowledge  of  these  precious  truths, 
hide  from  him  the  benefit  to  be  derived  from 
affliction,  take  away  his  consciousness  of  the 
divine  love  in  the  midst  of  it  all,  and  remove 
from  him  the  assurance  of  the  everlasting 
reward  which  shall  infinitely  more  than  com- 
pensate all  that  he  now  endures,  and  how 
defenceless  would  he  appear  in  the  presence 
of  heavy  griefs !  These  wellsprings  of  con- 
solation had  not  yet  been  opened.  These 
comforting  truths  had  never  found  utterance 
in  human  speech.  Simple  and  obvious  as 
they  now  appear  to  us  from  frequent  repeti- 
tion, and  belonging  to  the  very  alphabet  of 
our  religion,  they  had  never  been  distinctly 
formulated,  and  no  clear  conception  of  them 
had  ever  been  reached.  Job  must  fight  the 
battle  without  the  aids  which  his  experience 


82  JOB    IN    AFFLICTION. 

as  well  as  later  revelations  have  furnished 
us.  His  sorrows  came  upon  him,  not  for 
his  own  sake  merely,  but  for  ours.  A  new 
lesson  was  to  be  given  to  the  world ;  and  Job 
was  to  be  the  medium  of  instruction.  The 
stream  of  adversity  swells  around  him,  until 
in  danger  of  sinking  he  is  compelled  to  strug- 
gle with  all  his  might  to  get  upon  the  sure 
foundation.  Where  he  finds  firm  footing, 
other  children  of  sorrow  may  safely  tread. 

The  spectacle  before  us,  then,  is  that  of  this 
eminent  man  of  God,  chosen  to  be  the  leader 
of  the  band  of  sufferers  in  their  mortal  con- 
flict with  evil  and  the  evil  one.  He  goes  into 
the  strife  unpractised  and  unawares.  The 
onset  of  the  foe  is  fierce  and  furious.  Will 
even  Job  be  able  to  stand  in  the  evil  day? 

The  conflict  unfolds  itself  in  three  suc- 
cessive stages  of  growing  violence,  and  the 
demeanor  of  this  holy  man  is  depicted  to  us 
in  each.  In  the  first,  we  behold  him  in  one 
evil  day  suddenly  and  irretrievably  despoiled 
of  all  his  possessions.  In  the  morning  his 
sky  was  without   a  cloud.      He  was   in  the 


JOB    IN    AFFLICTION.  83 

midst  of  the  prosperous  abundance  which  he 
had  long  enjoyed,  and  seemed  to  have  every 
reason  to  feel  secure  of  its  continuance.  It 
was  in  fact  a  day  of  special  festivity  and 
family  reunion  ;  and,  so  far  from  leading  to 
the  anticipation  of  evil,  it  was  an  occasion  of 
more  than  ordinary  joy.  Happy  in  his  chil- 
dren, and  in  his  possessions,  and  in  the  re- 
spect and  consideration  universally  accorded 
to  him,  his  cup  of  blessing  overflowed. 
And  there  was  nothing  to  suggest  the  like- 
lihood of  a  coming  reverse.  And  yet,  before 
that  day  was  ended,  every  thing  was  gone. 
To  such  destitution  was  he  reduced  that  his 
condition  is  aptly  likened  to  that  of  a  new- 
born child.  He  came  naked  into  the  world  ; 
and  now  that  he  had  been  stripped  of  all,  he 
shall  leave  it  as  naked  as  he  came. 

Suddenly,  and  without  a  moment's  warning, 
the  storm  of  calamity  burst  over  the  head 
of  the  doom.ed  patriarch.  One  messenger  of 
evil  chased  another  with  tidings  of  disaster. 
One  had  not  ended  his  tale  of  loss  before 
another  came  with  a  tale  more   doleful  still. 


84  JOB    IN    AFFLICTION. 

His  oxen  and  his  asses  were  driven  off  by  the 
wild  and  roving  tribe  of  the  Sabeans ;  his 
sheep  were  consumed  by  fire  from  heaven ; 
his  camels  were  carried  away  by  plundering 
bands  of  Chaldeans;  and  his  servants  put 
to  the  sword.  And,  to  complete  the  dismal 
intelligence  of  woe,  the  house  in  which  his 
children  were  assembled,  and  passing  the 
hours  in  glad  hilarity,  was  overturned  by  a 
tornado  and  fell  upon  them  all,  crushing 
them  to  death.  I'n  one  moment  of  terrible 
reverse  the  stricken  patriarch  is  bereaved  of 
his  children  and  despoiled  of  his  property. 
All  is  taken  from  him  in  an  instant ;  and,_of 
all  that  he  had  cherished  and  delighted  in 
and  prized  of  earthly  good,  he  has  nothing 
left. 

If  the  calamity  had  been  less  sweeping  and 
universal,  it  would  not  have  been  so  over- 
whelming. If  something  had  been  spared 
him,  if  it  had  been  only  a  part  of  his  prop- 
erty and  not  the  whole  which  was  taken,  the 
loss  might  still  have  been  considerable,  it 
might  have  been  heavy,  it  might  have  involved 


JOB    IN    AFFLICTION.  85 

the  greater  part  of  his  fortune  ;  still,  if  he  had 
not  lost  all,  it  would  have  been  easier  to  bear 
it  with  equanimity.  Or  though  all  his  prop- 
erty were  taken  from  him,  if  those  posses- 
sions had  been  left  which  were  dearer  far 
than  flocks  and  herds,  those  precious  domes- 
tic treasures  which  he  valued  beyond  all  his 
wealth,  —  if  his  beloved  children  had  been 
spared,  it  would  have  been  easier  to  bear  the 
loss  of  all  beside.  It  would  have  been  hard 
to  part  with  one  of  that  cherished  circle  that 
he  prized  so  much  and  loved  so  fondly ;  but 
to  lose  not  only  one,  nor  two,  nor  three,  but 
all,  and  all  at  once,  this  was  bereavement  and 
desolation  indeed. 

If  the  blows  had  not  fallen  so  suddenly 
and  in  such  quick  succession ;  if  he  could 
have  had  some  time  in  which  to  steady  him- 
self for  the  shock ;  if  there  had  been  some 
intervals  of  relief  in  which  he  could  have 
summoned  all  his  strength  to  meet  the  com- 
ing blows,  it  would  have  seemed  less  dreadful, 
it  would  not  have  been  so  crushing  as  when 
the  whole  dire  weight  came  down  upon  him 


86  JOB    IN   AFFLICTION. 

at  a  stroke.  By  this  accumulation  of  sorrows 
so  suddenly  sprung  upon  Job,  the  violence 
of  the  attack  was  increased  to  the  utmost, 
and  thus  his  steadfastness  was  put  to  the 
severest  test.  Can  the  tempter  drive  him 
thus  to  give  up  his  integrity  and  abandon 
his  trust  in  God  ? 

Under  the  pressure  of  sore  affliction  men 
are  in  danger  of  falling  into  one  or  other  of 
two  opposite  extremes,  either  of  which  is  in- 
consistent with  fidelity  to  the  Lord's  service. 
The  first  is  that  of  repining  and  murmuring 
at  the  divine  allotment :  the  other  is  that  of 
bearing  it  in  a  spirit  of  stoical  indifference. 
The  wise  man  warns  us  against  both.  "  My 
son,  despise  not  thou  the  chastening  of  the 
Lord,  nor  faint  when  thou  art  rebuked  of 
Him."  Job  avoided  both  these  dangers  in 
that  subdued  but  noble  demeanor  which  has 
been  in  all  ages  since  the  model  of  submissive 
resignation.  The  stricken  patriarch,  bowed 
with  grief,  adopts  the  tokens  of  the  most  pro- 
found humiliation  and  sorrow :  he  rent  his 
mantle,  and  shaved  his  head,  and  fell  down 


JOB    IN    AFFLICTION.  87 

upon  the  ground.  Not  to  sit  in  sullen  silence, 
and  brood  despondently  over  the  terrible 
losses  which  he  had  sustained ;  not  to  complain 
of  the  providence  of  God,  which  had  dealt  so 
hardly  with  him  :  no,  he  prostrates  himself  in 
reverential  worship ;  he  bows  with  meek  sub- 
mission to  Him  who  had  smitten  him;  and 
his  only  language  is  that  of  grateful  adoration 
to  the  Source  of  all  blessings,  who  in  remov- 
ing all  had  but  taken  away  what  He  Himself 
had  given.  Job  fell  down  upon  the  ground 
and  worshipped ;  and  said,  "  Naked  came  I 
out  of  my  mother's  womb,  and  naked  shall 
I  return  thither.  The  Lord  gave,  and  the 
Lord  hath  taken  away ;  blessed  be  the  name 
of  the  Lord."  Can  humble,  trustful  piety 
reach  a  sublimer  utterance  than  this.f*  He 
has  been  cast  down  from  the  height  of  his 
prosperity ;  has  suffered  the  total  wreck  of 
his  fortune  and  the  loss  of  all  his  family ;  he 
is  weighed  to  the  earth  with  his  crushing  sor- 
rows ;  and  yet,  with  bleeding  heart  and  pros- 
trate form,  this  venerable  man  utters  not  one 
word  of  complaint.     So  far  is  he  from  giving 


88  JOB    IN    AFFLICTION. 

up  his  confidence  in  the  goodness  of  the 
Lord,  that  he  strengthens  himself  in  this  con- 
fidence by  the  very  greatness  of  the  calamity 
that  he  has  suffered,  and  draws  his  argument 
of  praise  for  the  multitude  of  God's  mercies 
from  the  very  bitterness  of  the  cup  that  is 
now  pressed  to  his  lips. 

The  submission  of  Job  is  not  merely  that 
he  yields  to  what  is  inevitable  ;  that  seeing 
the  stroke  of  fate  has  fallen,  and  its  blow  can- 
not be  turned  aside,  and  the  past  cannot  be 
undone,  he  resigns  himself  to  what  is  beyond 
the  possibility  of  repair.  Nor  does  he  merely 
succumb  to  Omnipotence,  convinced  that  it 
is  futile  to  resist  what  the  almighty  God  has 
appointed.  None  can  stay  His  hand,  or  pre- 
vent the  execution  of  His  sovereign  will.  It 
can  be  of  no  avail  to  oppose  himself  to  Him, 
and  so  he  subsides  in  forced  acquiescence. 
Nor  is  it  merely  the  rectitude  of  the  infinite 
Ruler  before  which  he  falls  prostrate,  who 
has  a  right  to  do  as  He  will  with  His  own, 
and  who  can  dispose  of  his  creatures  accord- 
ing to   His  sovereign  pleasure.     Job  meekly 


JOB    IN    AFFLICTION.  89 

bows  not  before  the  stroke  of  inevitable  fate, 
not  simply  before  the  resistless  energy  of 
almighty  power,  nor  simply  before  the 
righteous  control  of  the  sovereign  Ruler ; 
but  before  the  goodness  of  the  Lord,  a  sense 
of  which  now  fills  his  heart  proportioned  to 
the  magnitude  of  the  reverse  which  he  has 
sustained.  "  The  Lord  gave,  and  the  Lord 
hath  taken  away ;  blessed  be  the  name  of  the 
Lord."  The  bitterness  of  his  loss  is  made 
the  measure  of  the  preciousness  of  the  bless- 
ings God  had  given.  The  severity  of  his 
trial  consists  in  parting  with  what  God  had 
bestowed.  Every  pang  that  now  rends  his 
heart  is  a  fresh  proof  how  gracious  God  has 
been.  The  magnitude  of  the  loss  determines 
the  value  of  the  gift,  and  the  depth  of  his 
anguish  enhances  his  grateful  sense  of  the 
goodness  of  the  Giver.  The  more  deeply  he 
mourns  the  treasures  which  have  been  taken 
away  from  him,  the  higher  is  his  appreciation 
of  the  gracious  kindness  of  Him  who  be- 
stowed them.  Thus  the  more  profoundly  he 
grieves,  the  more  fervently  he  still  blesses  the 
name  of  the  Lord. 


90  JOB    IN    AFFLICTION. 

Not  that  he  sees  the  goodness  of  God  in 
afflicting  him.  This  was  a  lesson  Job  had 
not  yet  learned.  The  benefits  and  uses  of 
affliction,  and  the  gracious  design  with  which 
it  is  sent  of  God,  had  not  yet  been  revealed. 
It  was  through  these  trials  of  Job  himself,  and 
the  disclosure  of  His  purposes  thus  given, 
and  the  providential  issue  of  His  dealings  with 
His  servant,  that  the  first  rays  of  light  were 
shed  on  this  dark  and  mysterious  subject. 
It  was  partly  in  order  to  afford  an  occasion 
for  giving  these  lessons  to  the  world,  which 
might  lighten  the  sorrows,  and  ease  the  bur- 
dens, and  mitigate  the  trials  of  subsequent 
sufferers,  that  these  distresses  were  sent  on 
Job.  Thus  did  he  in  a  measure  suffer  for 
our  sakes,  and  by  his  stripes  we  are  healed  ; 
as  a  forerunner  and  a  type  of  the  great  Prince 
of  sufferers,  of  whom  this  was  true  in  its 
strictest  and  highest  sense. 

But  these  lessons,  which  we  have  learned 
from  the  example  of  Job  and  the  measures  of 
God's  grace  with  him,  as  well  as  from  later 
revelations,  were  all  unknown  as  yet  to  the 


JOB    IN    AFFLICTION.  9 1 

patriarch  himself.  He  knew  not  that  afflic- 
tion was  a  means  of  grace  ;  that  there  was 
heaHng  in  the  bitter  draught ;  that  there 
was  mercy  in  these  seeming  frowns ;  that  all 
that  he  experienced  was  in  fact  the  chastise- 
ment of  love.  He  knew  not  even  that  it  was 
a  trial  and  a  test  of  his  integrity  and  pious 
faith  in  God ;  and  that  the  Lord  regarded 
with  complacent  approbation  his  steadfast 
endurance  of  the  test  thrust  upon  him  by 
his  great  adversary. 

And  it  heightens  our  conception  of  Job's 
sterling  piety,  and  gives  us  loftier  apprehen- 
sions of  the  nobility  of  his  character,  and 
enhances  to  our  view  his  sublimely  meek  and 
submissive  demeanor,  when  we  see  him  con- 
fronting the  unsolved  enigma  of  this  mysteri- 
ous dispensation,  and  deducing  from  it  fresh 
matter  for  grateful  praise.  He  not  merely 
confesses  that  He  who  gave  might  justly  with- 
draw His  own,  so  that,  whatever  his  losses,  his 
mouth  is  stopped  from  making  any  complaint. 
But  the  withdrawal  of  the  gift  makes  him 
sensible  of  its  greatness,  and,  instead  of  draw- 


92  JOB    IN    AFFLICTION. 

ing  from  him  the  language  of  repining,  com- 
pels him  to  the  utterance  of  praise,  —  "  Blessed 
be  the  name  of  the  Lord." 
V  The  first  stage  of  the  trial  is  ended,  and  the 
tempter  is  foiled.  The  record  is,  '*  In  all  this 
Job  sinned  not,  nor  charged  God  foolishly." 

But  the  tempter  is  not  yet  satisfied,  and 
Job's  piety  must  be  put  to  a  yet  further  proof. 
He  has  borne  with  becoming  resignation  the 
loss  of  all  outward  possessions,  the  ruin  of  his 
property,  the  decease  of  his  children ;  but 
how  if  the  blow  should  fall  not  on  what  he 
owns,  but  upon  himself  ?  Satan  accordingly 
meditates  a  fresh  onset,  and  leave  is  given 
him  to  aggravate  the  sorrows  of  Job  already 
so  great  by  an  additional  disaster.  To  the 
calamities  previously  sent  is  now  added  an 
infliction  upon  his  own  person,  —  a  most  dis- 
tressing, offensive,  and  acute  disease,  one  of 
the  symptoms  of  which  was  an  eruption  of 
painful  ulcers,  covering  his  entire  body.  He 
was  smitten  with  sore  boils  from  the  sole  of 
his  foot  to  his  crown.  "  And  he  took  him  a 
potsherd  to  scrape  himself  withal ;  and  he  sat 
down  among  the  ashes. 


JOB    IN    AFFLICTION.  93 

Can  Job  bear  up  under  this  new  distress  ? 
What  will  be  the  effect  of  pain  and  bodily 
suffering  added  to  the  shock  of  former  sor- 
rows ?  Now  that  he  is  weakened  by  disease 
and  distracted  by  torturing  anguish  in  every 
member  of  his  body,  will  it  be  strange  if  the 
trustful  submission  which  he  has  maintained 
hitherto  gives  way?  and  though  he  has 
borne  his  previous  trials  with  noble  fortitude, 
and  he  has  seen  his  property  swept  away, 
and  his  children  taken  from  him  with  tran- 
quil resignation,  he  should  be  unable  to  with- 
stand the  pressure  of  this  new  calamity,  and 
physical  suffering  should  extort  from  him 
murmurs  and  repining  words,  and  lead  him 
to  cherish  hard  thoughts  of  God,  and  give  up 
his  trust  in  His  goodness  and  His  gracious 
providence ;  and  thus  the  tempter  should  at 
length  succeed,  and  Job's  piety  be  put  to  a 
test  which  it  could  not  bear? 

The  trial  proves  too  much  for  his  wife. 
Her  fortitude  forsakes  her  at  this  new  spec- 
tacle of  woe.  "  Dost  thou  still  retain  thine 
integrity?  "  she  says  to  him:  "curse  God,"  — 


94  JOB    IN    AFFLICTION. 

or  rather,  take  leave  of  God,  abandon  his  ser- 
vice, —  "  and  die."  The  wife  of  Job  has  often 
been  misjudged,  and  the  meaning  of  her 
words  misunderstood.  She  has  been  cen- 
sured as  though  she  were  destitute  of  piety, 
had  neither  love  nor  sympathy  for  her  hus- 
band, and  were  lacking,  in  fact,  in  common 
humanity.  It  has  even  been  hinted  that 
Satan  showed  his  hostility  to  Job  no  less  in 
sparing  her  to  be  a  torment  to  him  than  in 
taking  the  lives  of  his  children.  The  repre- 
sentation is  frequently  made,  that,  never  hav- 
ing sympathized  with  Job  in  his  piety,  she 
was  provoked  that  he  should  maintain  it  still 
when  it  had  proved  so  unprofitable  and  was 
so  poorly  rew^arded.  And  she  bids  him 
curse  God  and  die,  as  though  she  would  have 
him  bid  defiance  to  his  Maker,  from  whom  he 
received  nothing  but  unmerited  injuries  and 
ill-treatment;  as  though  she  would  have  him 
upbraid  Him  with  the  causeless  suffering  He 
had  brought  upon  him,  if  he  perished  for  it ; 
with  the  intimation  perhaps  that  he  might  as 
well  die  in  the  wretched  condition  in  which  he 


JOB    IN    AFFLICTION.  95 

then  was,  it  would  the  sooner  end  his  misery  ; 
and  possibly  also  with  the  hard-hearted  sug- 
gestion that  it  was  of  little  concern  to  her,  as 
he  had  ceased  to  be  any  thing  but  a  burden, 
of  which  she  was  willing  to  be  relieved. 

We  cannot  but  look  upon  this  severity  of 
censure  as  quite  undeserved.  It  is  unfair  to 
put  the  worst  construction  possible  upon  the 
language  of  Job's  wife  in  this  case,  and  then 
make  her  conduct  on  this  occasion  the  index 
to  her  whole  life.  Such  a  judgment  is  al- 
together misleading,  and  gives  a  perverted 
view  of  the  incident  itself  which  is  here 
recorded,  and  of  the  design  with  which  it  is 
introduced.  There  is  no  intimation  either 
here,  or  in  the  single  allusion  subsequently 
made  to  the  wife  of  Job,  xix.  17,  that  there 
had  been  any  unhappiness  in  Job's  domestic 
life ;  that  his  wife  had  been  uncongenial  to 
him,  a  thorn  in  his  side,  or  any  thing  other 
than  the  worthy  partner  of  such  a  husband, 
his  joy  and  solace,  united  with  him  in  heart 
and  life,  approving  and  sharing  his  upright- 
ness and  pious  trust   in   God.     Else  in  the 

5 


96  JOB    IN    AFFLICTION. 

days  of  his  former  prosperity  his  felicity 
could  not  have  been  as  pure  and  untroubled 
as  it  is  represented  to  have  been ;  and  when 
his  prosperity  again  returns  there  is  no  inti- 
mation that  she  served  in  any  wise  to  make 
his  happiness  incomplete. 

And,  so  far  as  appears,  she  had  borne  their 
first  terrible  trial  with  a  like  spirit  of  meek  and 
submissive  resignation  to  that  of  Job  himself. 
She  had  faced  adversity  as  bravely  as  he.  At 
least  we  hear  of  no  murmur  from  her  lips 
any  more  than  from  his  on  that  dreadful  day 
of  disaster  and  sudden  reverse,  when  property 
and  children  were  all  swept  remorselessly 
away,  and  they  were  left  destitute  and  alone 
in  remediless  desolation.  She  offered  no 
word  of  protest  then,  against  Job's  utterance 
of  pious  resignation.  So  far  as  appears,  her 
heart  went  with  his.  She,  too,  parted  with 
her  wealth  and  with  her  children  without 
one  repining  word. 

But  when  her  last  earthly  prop  is  breaking, 
and  her  only  surviving  solace  is  perishing 
before  her  eyes,  and  she  sees  her  husband  in 


JOB    IN    AFFLICTION.  97 

such  misery  and  suffering,  and  sinking  into 
death  by  so  frightful  a  disease,  she  is  well- 
nigh  frantic  in  her  despair;  her  fortitude 
gives  way ;  her  trust  in  God,  which  she  had 
cherished  hitherto,  passes  under  a  cloud. 
She  feels  that  it  is  a  cruel  dispensation,  and 
He  is  cruel  who  has  inflicted  it.  She  cannot 
longer  give  her  adoration  to  a  Being  who 
rewards  His  faithful  worshippers  thus ;  who 
wantonly  sends  such  dire  extremity  of  woe, 
and  has  brought  such  desolation  upon  her 
household  and  her  heart.  And  she  cannot 
bear  to  have  her  husband  in  his  helpless  mis- 
ery continue  to  bless  and  to  adore  the  God 
who  is  torturing  him  to  death.  A  God  so 
pitiless  and  so  cruel  it  were  better  to  take 
leave  of  than  to  worship  ;  to  renounce  His 
service  than  to  serve  Him,  and  be  requited 
thus.  It  were  as  well  to  curse  Him  as  to 
bless,-  for  in  this  desperate  extremity  it  can 
make  matters  no  worse,  for  death  is  equally 
at  hand  in  either  case.  Since  you  must  die, 
die  cursing,  not  blessing,  the  author  of  your 
misery,  the  source  of  all  our  bitter  woe. 


98  JOB    IN    AFFLICTION. 

And  thus  the  loving  wife  in  the  frenzy 
of  her  anguish  has  ranged  herself  unwit- 
tingly upon  the  tempter's  side.  It  is  not 
the  first  nor  only  time  that  fond  hearts 
and  friendly  hands  have  unknowingly  leagued 
themselves  with  the  destroyer,  and  ignorantly 
done  the  work  of  Satan.  That  Job's  wife  did 
what  she  did  under  the  impulse  of  her  affec- 
tions, seems  to  be  implied  in  the  connection. 
Her  words  are  introduced  as  adding^  force  to 
the  temptation,  and  affording  a  fresh  exhi- 
bition of  the  firmness  of  Job's  piety.  Cold, 
unfeeling  sarcasm  and  impious  taunt  from 
his  wife  would  not  have  enticed,  but  rather 
repelled.  Instead  of  assailing  his  integrity 
at  a  new  and  tender  point,  it  would  have 
naturally  thrown  him  into  an  attitude  of 
resistance  to  the  heartless  and  wicked  sug- 
gestion. 

But  the  case  is  altered,  if  we  see  in  his 
wife  one  who  tenderly  loves  him,  and  whom 
he  fondly  loves.  She  has  stood  firmly  with 
him  hitherto,  but  now  at  length  her  con- 
stancy is  overcome ;  and  she  would  persuade 


JOB    IN    AFFLICTION.  99 

him,  too,  to  abandon  his  piety,  which  has  not 
availed  to  save  him  from  this  dismal  fate,  and 
to  give  up  the  service  of  a  God  who,  with 
such  a  disregard  of  His  constant,  faithful 
worship,  has  so  causelessly  and  cruelly  af- 
flicted him.  Job  has  borne  all  former  disas- 
ters unmoved.  His  bodily  sufferings  even 
cannot  shake  his  integrity.  And  now  the 
solicitations  of  his  wife  he  turns  aside.  His 
reply  to  her  suggestion  is  not  harsh  and 
severe,  as  it  is  frequently  interpreted,  but 
rather  the  language  of  pained  surprise.  It  is 
not  a  stern  censure,  but  a  mild  rebuke,  though 
decided  in  its  rejection  of  her  ill-judged  coun- 
sel. He  does  not  rudely  charge  her  with 
being  herself  a  foolish  woman,  whether  the 
meaning  be  destitute  of  sense  or  lacking  in 
true  piety.  He  simply  says  this  was  not 
spoken  like  herself ;  it  is  such  a  suggestion 
as  he  would  not  have  expected  from  her. 
She  had  spoken  not  with  her  usual  wisdom 
and  pious  feeling,  but  as  one  of  the  foolish 
women  speaketh.  "  What !  shall  we  receive 
good  at  the  hand  of  God,  and  shall  we  not 
receive  evil } " 


lOO  JOB    IN    AFFLICTION. 

Job's  trust  in  the  goodness  of  the  Lord 
does  not  falter  yet.  Here  was  not,  as  in  his 
former  trial,  a  simple  withdrawal  of  what 
God  had  previously  given  and  in  which  the 
amount  so  withdrawn  was  simply  an  index  to 
the  goodness  of  Him  who  had  bestowed  it. 
There  was  now  not  the  mere  privation  of 
good,  but  the  positive  infliction  of  evil,  of  suf- 
fering and  pain.  Job  knows  not  that  this 
suffering  encloses  a  benefit,  and  is  sent  with 
a  benevolent  design.  He  cannot  therefore 
praise  God  for  the  suffering  itself,  and  ac- 
knowledge in  it  a  token  of  the  divine  good- 
ness, as  he  might  have  done  if  the  lesson  had 
been  taught  him  which  the  Psalmist  learned 
when  he  said,  "  It  is  good  for  me  that  I  have 
been  afflicted,"  and  which  the  apostle  ex- 
pressed when  he  said,  "  We  glory  in  tribula- 
tions also,"  "  I  take  pleasure  in  infirmities, 
in  reproaches,  in  necessities,  in  persecutions, 
in  distresses  for  Christ's  sake."  Job  did  not 
yet  know  that  all  things  work  together  for 
good  to  them  that  love  God.  He  did  not 
understand  that  pain  and  suffering  were  or 


JOB    IN    AFFLICTION.  IQI 

could  be  any  thing  else  but  evils.  Yet  regard- 
ing them  simply  in  this  light,  as  evils,  and  evils 
received  from  the  hand  of  God,  they  did  not 
blind  him  to  the  fact  of  the  divine  goodness 
and  the  great  preponderance  of  blessing 
received  from  His  bountiful  hand.  The 
evil  does  not  by  any  means  match  the  good, 
much  less  outweigh  it.  Shall  we  forget  the 
immensity  of  the  benefits  bestowed  because 
He  also  sends  some  suffering  .f^  Shall  we 
receive  good  at  the  hand  of  God,  and  shall 
we  not  receive  evil? 

Job  is  again  victorious,  and  the  tempter 
is  once  more  foiled.  His  piety  has  proved 
equal  to  the  severity  of  this  fresh  test  to 
which  it  v/as  subjected.  "In  all  this,"  the 
record  runs,  "  did  not  Job  sin  with  his  lips." 

But  Job's  trial  is  not  yet  ended.  He  has 
passed  through  two  stages  of  it,  and  has  suc- 
cessfully surmounted  them.  Thus  far  his 
piety  has  borne  the  test  triumphantly,  to  the 
confusion  of  the  tempter.  He  suffered  the 
loss  of  his  property  and  of  his  children  with 
noble  resignation ;  with  his  heart  wrung  with 


I02  JOB    IN    AFFLICTION. 

grief,  clad  in  the  insignia  of  mourning  and 
prostrate  on  the  earth,  he  still  blessed  the 
name  of  the  Lord.  He  bore  the  further 
infliction  of  what  was  deemed  a  fatal  disease, 
accompanied  by  acute  bodily  suffering,  with 
heroic  fortitude ;  and  though  his  wife  herself 
threw  her  w^eight  upon  the  side  of  tempta- 
tion, he  still  held  fast  his  integrity,  and  sub- 
missively received  evil  as  well  as  good  from 
the  hand  of  the  Lord.  But  the  third  stage 
of  the  temptation  is  yet  before  him,  and  it 
will  test  his  endurance  more  severely  still. 
It  is  the  persistence  of  suffering,  its  continued 
pressure  through  long  intervals  of  time. 

Many  a  citadel  is  proof  against  assault, 
which  yet  may  be  obliged  to  succumb  to  the 
slow  and  steady  progress  of  a  siege.  Con- 
stant dropping  wears  away  rocks.  There  are 
limits  beyond  which  human  endurance  can- 
not go.  The  first  onset  of  pain  and  suffering 
is  not  nearly  so  formidable  as  its  protracted 
continuance,  which  wears  out  the  strength 
and  uses  up  the  capacity  of  resistance.  Pain 
which  can  be  patiently  borne  for  a  short  time 


JOB    IN    AFFLICTION.  I03 

becomes  intolerable  after  a  longer  period. 
Sad  indeed  is  the  condition  of  the  worn  and 
weary  sufferer,  whose  strength  is  exhausted, 
his  spirits  sunk,  his  buoyancy  gone,  all  hope 
fled ;  unable  to  calm  his  irritated  nerves  or 
ease  his  aching  limbs,  restless  and  unquiet, 
finding  no  repose,  no  comfortable  posture  and 
no  cessation  of  pain,  just  wearing  out  the 
tiresome  hours  as  they  drag  heavily  along ; 
through  all  the  tedious  night,  and  night  after 
night  watching  for  the  dawn,  which  in  its 
turn  brings  no  relief;  and  through  all  the 
day  sighing  for  the  night,  though  the  night 
brings  no  repose.  It  is  not  so  much  the 
amount  of  pain  endured  at  any  one  moment 
as  its  long  and  wearisome  continuance  that 
is  so  hard  to  bear.  This  weary,  exhausting 
round  of  suffering,  with  no  prospect  of  relief, 
is  the  third  stage  of  Job's  heavy  trial.  The 
tempter,  who  had  twice  failed  in  his  fierce 
onset,  would  now  wear  him  out,  if  possible, 
and  break  his  strength  by  continued  en- 
durance. 

Day  after  day,  week  after  week,  he  is  still 

5* 


I04  JOB    IN    AFFLICTION. 

compelled  to  drag  his  heavy  burden,  and  he 
does  so  in  silence.  How  long  we  know  not. 
It  was  some  time  after  his  seizure  before  his 
friends  arrived  to  comfort  him.  Doubtless  a 
number  of  days  had  passed  before  they  heard 
of  his  calamity.  A  further  interval  was  con- 
sumed in  concerting  an  appointment  to 
come.  When  they  arrived,  his  disease  had 
already  so  altered  his  features  and  form  that 
they  lifted  up  their  eyes  and  knew  him  not. 
And  after  their  arrival  they  sat  with  him 
seven  days  and  seven  nights  before  Job 
uttered  a  word  of  lamentation.  Through  all 
this  protracted  period  he  bore  his  grief  in 
silence.  But  at  length  his  sorrows  grow 
beyond  his  power  to  suppress  them,  and  he 
breaks  forth  in  the  piteous  meanings  of  in- 
tolerable anguish.  He  has  borne  the  torture 
with  pious  fortitude,  until  at  length  nature 
can  hold  out  no  more :  he  can  endure  it  no 
longer,  and  he  gives  vent  to  the  most  dis- 
tressed sighs  and  groans  ;  but  in  it  all  observe 
that  he  does  not  rail  against  God. 

In  the   most  passionate   manner  he  utters 


JOB    IN    AFFLICTION.  IO5 

his  wailing  cry.  With  the  most  vehement 
expressions  he  heaps  execrations  on  the  day 
in  which  he  was  born  ;  he  wishes  that  day 
blotted  from  existence,  —  in  other  words,  that 
it  had  never  been,  —  so  that  it  could  not  have 
inflicted  upon  him  the  misery  of  an  intoler- 
able existence.  Oh  that  he  had  never  been 
born !  Oh  that  when  born  he  had  perished, 
neglected  and  uncared  for,  and  thus  might 
never  have  come  to  know  the  wretchedness 
of  living !  Oh  if  he  had  but  found  in  early 
infancy  a  grave,  which  closes  over  all  alike, 
and  sweeps  into  its  all-devouring  maw  the  rich 
and  great,  kings  and  counsellors,  the  prisoner 
and  the  oppressor,  the  master  and  his  slave, 
gathering  all  into  that  profound  and  undis- 
turbed repose,  which  now  is  denied  to  him ! 
Oh,  how  he  longs  for  death !  he  would  clutch  at 
it  as  the  miser  grasps  his  gold,  as  men  dig 
for  hidden  treasures.  Why  is  this  coveted 
privilege  of  death  denied  him? 

Thus  the  poor  sufferer  bemoans  his  dismal 
fate.  It  is  the  doleful  lament  of  one  who  has 
more  laid  upon  him  than  he  can  bear.     It  is 


I06  JOB    IN    AFFLICTION. 

not  the  utterance  of  considerate  reflection. 
It  is  not  the  expression  of  deliberate  views. 
The  sentences  are  not  to  be  nicely  weighed, 
and  their  propriety  or  impropriety  passed 
upon  as  though  they  were  spoken  in  moments 
of  calm  repose.  They  must  be  judged  of 
from  the  situation  of  Job.  They  are  the 
language  of  one  tortured  beyond  endurance, 
who  cannot  support  the  anguish  that  he  suf- 
fers, and  whose  life  has  become  an  intolerable 
burden.  Allowance  must  be  made  for  these 
paroxysms  of  helpless,  hopeless  sorrow.  His 
strength  was  not  the  strength  of  stones,  nor 
his  flesh  of  brass.  He  was  incapable  himself 
of  w^eighing  what  he  uttered.  It  only  repre- 
sents the  bitterness  of  irrepressible  woe. 

Still,  bruised  as  he  is,  hopeless  of  good, 
with  but  one  wish,  and  this  that  he  might  die. 
Job  does  not  reproach  or  revile  his  Maker. 
The  tempter  has  broken  his  spirit,  and 
crushed  him  to  the  earth  ;  but  he  has  not 
succeeded  yet  in  wresting  from  him  his 
integrity  or  bringing  him  to  forsake  his  God. 

Here  we  must  leave  the  patriarch  for  the 


JOB    IN    AFFLICTION.  107 

present.  This  third,  most  dreadful  stage  of 
his  trial  is  not  yet  ended.  The  tempter  has 
not  relaxed  his  hold.  He  has  new  instru- 
ments of  torture  to  apply  to  the  victim  already 
reduced  to  so  pitiable  a  condition  ;  and  he 
will  use  them  mercilessly.  He  sees  his  ad- 
vantage in  Job's  extremity  of  misery,  and  he 
will  push  it  to  the  bitter  end,  if  so  he  can 
wring  from  him  the  renunciation  of  his  trust 
in  God.  Will  he  be  able  to  compass  his 
malicious  design  .^^  The  future  will  reveal. 
Meanwhile  let  it  be  recorded  that  he  has  not 
succeeded  yet.  In  the  desperate  straits  to 
which  he  has  been  driven,  Job  has  not  yet 
renounced  the  service  of  the  Lord. 

And  may  He  whose  grace  supported  Job 
in  all  his  dreadful  trials  hitherto  grant  like 
grace  to  us,  —  grace  according  to  our  need, 
grace  to  do  according  to  the  measure  of  the 
task  required  of  us,  grace  to  bear  according 
to  the  measure  of  the  burden  laid  upon  us. 
And  to  His  name  be  praise.     Amen. 


CHAPTER   IV. 


Now  when  yob's  three  friends  heard  of  all  this 
evil  that  was  come  npon  hiin^  they  came  every  one  from, 
his  own  place ;  Eliphaz  the  Temanite^  and  Bildad 
the  Shuhite,  and  Zophar  tJie  NaamatJiite :  for  they 
had  made  an  appointment  together  to  come  to  mourn 
with  him,  and  to  comfort  him.  —  Job  ii.  1 1. 


JOB'S   THREE   FRIENDS. 


TOB'S  sorrows  seemed  to  have  reached 
their  last  extreme.  And  now  some  new 
personages  are  introduced  upon  the  scene, 
who  are  to  be  quite  conspicuous  in  the  re- 
mainder of  the  book.  Three  friends  meet  by 
appointment  at  the  house  of  the  suffering 
patriarch,  to  condole  with  and  to  comfort 
him.  The  prominence  accorded  to  them 
from  this  point  onward  shows  that  their  visit 
is  no  unimportant  incident,  but  that  it  is  a 
fact  of  great  consequence  in  the  transaction 
here  recorded.  A  very  large  space,  and 
indeed  the  greater  portion  of  the  book,  is 
occupied  with  what  they  say  to  Job,  which 
is  here  reported  in  detail,  and  with  what  he 
says   in    reply.     We  cannot  be  mistaken  in 


112  job's  three  friends. 


supposing  that  they  have  much  to  do  with 
the  case  here  pending.  They  are  not  mere 
spectators  in  a  scene  which  deeply  affects 
them  as  concerning  their  intimate  and  life- 
long friend.  They  are  themselves  actors  and 
participants,  and  that  in  a  most  significant 
and  important  way.  They  appear  in  the  very 
crisis  of  Job's  trial ;  in  the  last  and  most  terri- 
ble stage  of  his  sufferings,  and  when  it  would 
seem  as  though  nature  could  bear  no  more. 
They,  too,  are  unwittingly  taken  into  the  ser- 
vice of  the  tempter,  who  makes  use  of  them 
to  add  a  fresh  aggravation  to  Job's  intolerable 
woe,  which  is  most  artfully  contrived  to  drive 
him  to  that  result  which  Satan  seeks  to  com- 
pass, to  make  him  do  what  his  cunning  and 
unscrupulous  enemy  has  from  the  first  been 
aiming  to  bring  about,  viz.,  to  renounce  the 
service  of  the  Lord. 

The  alternate  discourses  of  the  friends  and 
of  Job  are  not  simply  a  discussion  of  the 
mysterious  subject  of  God's  afflictive  dispen- 
sations. They  are  not  to  be  sundered  from 
the  circumstances  in  which  they  are  uttered, 


JOBS    THREE    FRIENDS.  II3 

which  preckide  an  abstract  treatment  of  a 
general  theme.  They  are  occupied  with  the 
case  of  Job,  and  every  word  uttered  by  his 
friends  finds  its  way  to  the  sufferer's  heart. 
He  is  wounded  by  their  harshness,  stung  by 
their  censures,  exasperated  by  their  reproaches, 
and  driven  into  antagonism  by  their  argu- 
ments. They  are  the  professed  advocates 
of  rehgious  obHgation.  They  represent  the 
cause  of  God,  enforcing  His  claims  on  Job 
and  justifying  His  ways  with  him,  which  they 
do  in  a  spirit  that  repels  him,  with  assump- 
tions that  experience  does  not  sanction,  and 
which  his  own  inner  consciousness  falsifies. 
The  unfairness,  if  not  disingenuousness,  with 
which  they  plead  God's  cause,  place  him 
under  additional  temptation  to  reject  that 
cause  itself.  The  hopeless  variance  which 
they  assume  or  create  between  God's  justice 
and  Job's  integrity,  for  which  latter  he  never- 
theless has  the  testimony  of  his  own  con- 
science, which  he  cannot  surrender  or  falsify, 
tends  to  place  before  his  mind  a  distorted 
image  of  the  character  of  God.     God  appears 


114  JOBS    THREE    FRIENDS. 

to  be  torturing  him  for  crimes  which  he  has 
not  committed,  to  be  relentlessly  pursuing 
him  as  an  implacable  foe,  and  without  justice 
or  reason  to  be  employing  His  resistless 
power  to  crush  him  to  the  earth.  This  is  the 
phantom  which  his  friends  are  constantly  set- 
ting before  him,  this  false  notion  of  God  as 
unjust  and  pitiless  toward  him ;  and  this  his 
own  intolerable  sufferings,  for  which  he  can- 
not himself  otherwise  account,  seem  to  rivet 
upon  him.  This  phantom,  apparently  so  real, 
he  is  incessantly  obliged  to  fight,  or  it  would 
drive  him  to  absolute  despair,  and  force  him 
to  give  up  his  confidence  and  trust  in  God, 
and  thus  throw  him  completely  into  the 
tempter's  snare. 

This  is  the  point  around  which  the  con- 
flict in  Job's  soul  so  fearfully  rages,  which  is 
depicted  in  this  book  in  its  various  phases 
with  such  a  master  hand.  This  is  the  very 
acme  and  crisis  of  the  temptation.  This 
unwelcome  apparition,  which  his  friends  are 
constantly  bringing  up  and  dressing  out 
before   him,    of   a    God    of   arbitrary   power, 


job's  three  friends.  115 

whose  justice,  as  they  assert  it,  would  be  rank 
injustice,  and  who  seems  to  be  devoid  of  pity, 
—  this  it  is  which  fills  him  with  the  deepest 
anguish.  And  yet,  in  the  darkness  and  the 
mystery  of  his  unexplained  sufferings,  how  is 
he  to  rid  himself  of  it  ?  how  chase  the  dreaded 
spectre  away  ?  To  admit  this  conception  of 
God,  which  both  his  own  helpless  misery  and 
the  arguments  and  assertions  of  his  friends 
appear  to  force  upon  him,  is  to  fall  inevitably 
away  from  God's  service.  Such  a  God  might 
be  dreaded ;  but  it  is  impossible  that  He 
could  be  either  loved  or  feared. 

Here,  then,  are  Job's  three  friends,  who  as 
the  self-constituted  advocates  of  God,  and  the 
monitors  of  Job,  concerned  about  his  spiritual 
good,  are  busily  engaged  in  letting  fly  their 
poisoned  arrows  and  flinging  their  envenomed 
darts.  And  here  is  Job  himself  exposed  with- 
out shield  or  buckler  to  their  dangerous 
attacks.  Can  he  sustain  the  weight  of  this 
new  burden  ?  Can  he  hold  out  against  this 
fresh  assault?  Can  his  confidence  in  God 
remain  unshaken  when  every  prop  is  removed 


ii6  job's  three  friends. 

and  the  very  foundations  seem  to  be  swept 
away  ?  His  heart  is  all  laid  open  before  us, 
down  to  its  lowest  depths,  in  his  discourses 
with  his  friends.  Every  thing  is  faithfully 
photographed.  We  see  all  the  tumult  of  his 
soul  in  its  conflicting  emotions.  We  see  him 
now  sinking,  now^  rising ;  now  almost  gone, 
tottering  on  the  very  verge  of  the  precipice, 
over  which  to  fall  would  be  fatal ;  now  recoil- 
ing in  the  energy  of  his  still  unvanquished- 
faith  ;  giving  vent  to  expressions  wrung  from 
him  in  the  bitterness  of  his  spirit,  which  he 
would  not  have  uttered  in  calmer  moments, 
until  we  almost  dread  to  have  him  open  his 
mouth  again,  lest  he  should  in  his  desperation 
be  betrayed  into  speaking  the  fatal  word  to 
which  Satan  by  all  this  combination  of  forces 
is  ceaselessly  urging  him,  and  apparently 
shutting  him  up ;  beside  himself  with  intol- 
erable anguish,  the  terrors  of  God  driving 
him  to  distraction,  yet  through  it  all  he  is 
still  ever  and  anon  turnino^  unto  God  and 
tearfully  looking  up  to  Him,  his  only  hope 
and  solace.  Can  even  Job's  piety  still  hold 
out.f^     Shall  the  tempter  at  length  succeed  .^^ 


JOBS    THREE    FRIENDS.  II7 

In  order  that  we  may  the  better  under- 
stand how  and  to  what  extent  the  friends 
of  Job  aggravated  his  temptation,  it  will  be 
necessary  to  pay  more  particular  attention  to 
the  persons  of  these  friends,  and  their  conduct 
and  language  towards  Job.  This  is  the 
purpose  of  the  present  chapter. 

The  censure  which  the  Lord  Himself 
passes  upon  Job's  friends  at  the  close  of  the 
book,  and  the  fact  that  they  misapprehend  as 
they  do  the  cause  of  Job's  sufferings  and  the 
purpose  of  God's  dealings  with  him,  has  often 
led  to  an  undue  depreciation  of  their  charac- 
ter. Against  this  we  must  carefully  guard, 
or  we  shall  weaken  the  force  of  the  tempta- 
tion so  far  as  they  are  concerned,  which  lies 
greatly  in  this,  —  that  such  men  take  part  in  it, 
and  that  they  do  this  just  as  they  do,  and  to 
the  extent  that  they  do. 

We  have  reason  to  believe  that  these  were 
eminent  men,  wise  men,  and  good  men. 
They  were  cherished  and  familiar  friends  of 
Job,  such  as  he  would  naturally  lean  upon  in 
a  time  of  trouble,  or  turn  to  in  perplexity  for 


ii8  job's  three  friends. 

counsel  and  advice.  They  were  venerable 
men,  men  of  age  and  experience.  Eliphaz 
says  to  Job,  xv.  lo:  "  With  us  are  both  the 
gray-headed  and  very  aged  men,  much  elder 
than  thy  father."  We  cannot  think  of  Job, 
with  his  ten  children  grown  up  to  manhood 
and  womanhood,  as  at  this  time  much  less 
than  fifty-five  or  sixty  years  old.  Eliphaz 
in  this  statement  probably  refers  to  himself, 
since  the  precedence  is  accorded  to  him 
among  the  friends.  He  in  every  instance 
speaks  first,  and  is  followed  by  the  others,  and 
may  therefore  be  supposed  to  be  their  supe- 
rior in  age.  If  this  be  so,  and  he  alludes  to 
himself  as  "  gray-headed  and  very  aged,"  and 
"  much  elder  "  than  Job's  father,  he  must  have 
been  at  least  as  old  as  seventy-five  or  eighty. 
And  age  commanded  reverence,  more  even 
then,  in  the  patriarchal  period,  than  with  us. 
And  it  was  significant  of  distinction,  when 
the  oldest  living  ancestor  was  the  chieftain 
of  the  clan ;  when  he  was  the  visible  lord  of 
his  descendants,  and  the  recognized  authority 
looked   up   to,  deferred  to,  and  obeyed  in  all 


JOBS    THREE    FRIENDS.  II9 

their  families  and  dependants.  It  was  signifi- 
cant, too,  of  wisdom  gathered  by  long  experi- 
ence and  observation,  when  intercourse  with 
men,  and  acquaintance  with  things  rather 
than  knowledge  of  books,  were  the  chief 
sources  of  information. 

The   region  in  which  Job's  friends  resided 
should   also  be   noted,  for  it  was  proverbial 
for  the  sagacity  of  its  inhabitants ;  and  it  is 
not  unlikely  that  it  is  for  this  reason,  to  sug- 
gest that   they  were  men  of  superior  ability, 
of  intellectual  acumen,  and   of  extensive  ac- 
quirements, that  the  residence  of  each  is  par- 
ticularly mentioned,  —  Eliphaz  the  Temanite, 
Bildad  the  Shuhite,  and  Zophar  the   Naama- 
thite.     Teman  was  famous  for  its  wise  men, 
and   their  profound,  sententious  sayings ;   so 
was   in  fact   Arabia,  or  the  East,  the  country 
to  w^hich  the  other  friends  likewise  belonged. 
To  this  well-known  reputation  of  the  region 
the  prophet  alludes,  Jer.  xlix.  7  :  "Is  wdsdom 
no  more  in  Teman  ?  is  counsel  perished  from 
the    prudent  ?    is    their   wisdom    vanished  ?  " 
And    when    the    eminent    endowments    of 

6 


I20  job's  three  friends. 

Solomon  were  to  be  exalted  by  a  compari- 
son, the  sacred  writer  says  of  him,  i  Kings 
iv.  30 :  "  Solomon's  wisdom  excelled  the 
wisdom  of  all  the  children  of  the  east 
country." 

And  that  Job's  friends  were  worthy  rep- 
resentatives of  a  land  of  sages  is  shown 
by  their  speeches  here  recorded,  which  are 
marked  by  extensive  observation  and  careful 
reflection,  and  abound  in  beautiful  and  ap- 
propriate illustrations  drawn  from  both  nature 
and  experience.  Their  reasoning  is  fallacious, 
indeed,  because  built  on  false  though  spe- 
cious premises ;  but  their  arguments  are 
coherent  and  strongly  put.  They  fail  to 
convince  or  to  confute  Job,  but  it  is  from  no 
want  of  skill  in  advocacy :  they  prove  them- 
selves no  mean  antagonists,  and  it  requires 
all  his  address  to  parry  their  blows.  What 
saves  him  is  not  his  superiority  in  argument, 
but  that  it  is  a  matter  of  personal  conscious- 
ness about  which  they  contend.  No  subtle- 
ties and  no  cogency  of  demonstration  can 
convict  him  of  offences  of   which   his   own 


JOBS    THREE    FRIENDS.  121 

conscience  pronounces  him  innocent.  They 
misinterpret  the  ways  of  providence,  and  fail 
to  explain  the  mystery  of  Job's  sufferings. 
But  this  is  from  no  mental  incapacity.  Job 
can  see  no  farther  into  this  dark  dispensa- 
tion than  they  can.  He  knows  that  they  are 
mistaken.  But  he  no  more  understands  the 
real  state  of  the  case  than  they  do.  The  fact  is 
that  the  enigma  is  insoluble  by  the  unaided 
reason  of  man.  God  can  alone  declare  the 
purpose  of  His  afiflictive  dispensations,  and 
this  He  had  never  yet  revealed.  These  dis- 
tresses of  Job  were  to  afford  the  occasion  of 
shedding  the  first  rays  of  light  upon  it.  It  is 
no  discredit  to  the  friends  any  more  than  to 
Job  that  they  did  not  discern  what  they  had  no 
means  of  knowing.  In  what  they  really  were 
to  blame,  and  to  what  extent,  we  shall  inquire 
presently. 

They  were,  moreover,  good  men,  and  had 
at  heart  a  real  affection  for  Job.  The  whole 
tenor  of  their  speeches  shows  that  they  were 
concerned  both  for  the  honor  of  God  and  for 
the  spiritual  welfare  of  Job.     They  advocate 


122  job's  three  friends. 


and  approve  what  is  good,  they  reject  and 
condemn  the  bad.  Their  discourses  sparkle 
with  gems  of  morahty  and  rehgious  truth. 
The  principles  which  they  propound  are 
mostly  just  and  unexceptionable  as  general 
maxims.  It  is  only  the  application  which 
they  make  of  them  to  a  case  that  they  do  not 
really  cover,  which  is  false.  They  entertain 
a  true  friendship  for  Job ;  but  the  mistake 
under  which  they  are  with  regard  to  him  and 
his  trials  warps  their  judgment;  and,  in  their 
desire  to  reclaim  him  from  imaginary  wrong 
doing,  they  are  themselves  guilty  of  actual 
though  unintended  injustice,  and  treat  him 
with  unmerited  severity. 

The  friends  of  Job,  then,  as  we  may  con- 
ceive, were  men  of  distinction,  eminent  for 
wisdom  and  of  approved  piety,  worthy  confi- 
dants and  intimates  of  Job,  trusted  and  tried 
doubtless  in  the  companionship  of  years. 
They  hear  of  the  great  sorrows  of  their  friend, 
and  they  show  their  attachment  to  him  by 
agreeing  to  meet  at  his  house  to  mourn  with 
him  and  to  comfort  him.     They  bring  him  in 


JOBS    THREE    FRIENDS.  12  7, 

actual  fact  but  little  comfort,  it  is  true ;  but 
this  is  the  design  and  expectation  with  which 
they  come. 

It  is  important  to  observe  the  change 
which  takes  place  in  the  friends  themselves 
in  their  feelings  and  attitude  towards  Job  in 
the  progress  of  the  book.  This  is  depicted 
with  admirable  art,  and  is  essential  to  a  proper 
understanding  of  the  whole  transaction.  To 
impute  to  them  from  the  beginning  the  harsh 
and  ungenerous  suspicions  which  they  come  to 
entertain  and  express  towards  the  last,  is  to 
"mistake  their  character  entirely,  to  confuse 
what  is  perfectly  distinct,  and  to  lose  sight 
of  that  inward  revolution  in  their  sentiments 
respecting  Job  which  is  so  skilfully  drawn  and 
is  so  true  to  nature.  The  longer  the  friends 
argue  with  him  without  convincing  him,  the 
more  obdurate  and  incorrigible  he  appears  to 
them,  and  the  more  severe  is  the  censure 
which  they  are  disposed  to  pass  upon  him. 

They  come  with  sympathy  and  sorrow  for 
him  in  his  griefs.  Finding  him  so  changed 
that  they  no  longer  recognize  him,  they  are 


124  JOBS    THREE    FRIENDS. 

affected  to  tears.  "  They  lifted  up  their 
voice,  and  wept ;  and  they  rent  every  one 
his  mantle,  and  sprinkled  dust  upon  their 
heads  toward  heaven.  So  they  sat  down 
with  him  upon  the  ground  seven  days  and 
seven  nights,  and  none  spake  a  word  unto 
him  :  for  they  saw  that  his  grief  was  very 
great."  They  could  not  more  tenderly  and 
delicately  express  their  commiseration  for 
him  in  his  terrible  sorrows,  which  it  was 
beyond  the  power  of  human  helpers  to  miti- 
gate or  to  relieve.  In  all  this  there  was 
genuine  pity  and  compassion.  There  is  no 
room  for  supposing  that  they  entertained  any 
other  than  the  most  friendly  feelings,  or  that 
any  ungenerous  suspicions  had  as  yet  taken 
possession  of  their  minds  as  to  the  reality  of 
Job's  piety  or  the  reasons  of  these  extraor- 
dinary sufferings  which  had  been  sent  upon 
him. 

Job  first  breaks  the  mournful  silence  by  his 
outburst  of  lamentation,  extorted  by  insup- 
portable distress.  Eliphaz,  probably  the  eld- 
est and  most  respected  of  the  three  friends, 


JOBS    THREE    FRIENDS.  1 25 

as  he  is  certainly  the  most  dignified  and 
courteous  in  his  style  of  address,  first  makes 
reply.  And,  as  Job  answers  him,  he  is  succes- 
sively followed  by  Bildad  and  by  Zophar.  As 
the  interview  still  proceeds,  and  Job  continues 
to  respond,  the  friends  once  more  address 
themselves  to  him  in  the  same  order ;  and 
yet  again  the  third  time.  Only  in  the  third 
and  last  series  of  discourses  the  third  friend, 
Zophar,  fails  to  speak,  for  a  reason  to  be 
stated  hereafter.  Eliphaz  and  Bildad  accord- 
ingly each  speak  three  times,  and  Zophar 
twice,  Job  invariably  responding.  There  is 
thus  a  triple  series  of  discourses,  in  which  the 
growing  alienation  and  distrust  of  the  friends 
can  be  plainly  traced.  They  begin  with  com- 
parative mildness  and  expressions  of  regard. 
But,  as  the  discussion  advances,  they  are 
astounded  and  excited  by  Job's  opposition  to 
what  they  esteem  primary  principles  of  re- 
ligious faith  ;  they  are  provoked  and  incensed 
by  his  obstinacy,  his  want  of  submission  to  the 
divine  allotment,  and  by  his  language,  which 
appears  to  them  to  savor  of  irreverence  and 


126  job's  three  friends. 

impiety ;  until  at  length  they  lose  all  confi- 
dence in  his  uprightness  and  sincerity,  and 
believe  him  to  have  been  secretly  guilty  of 
the  most  atrocious  and  outrageous  crimes. 

When  Job,  unable  longer  to  contain  him- 
self under  the  pressure  of  his  anguish,  utters 
his  wail  of  frantic  grief,  cursing  the  day  in 
which  he  was  born,  and  complaining  that  life 
with  all  its  miseries  is  forced  upon  him,  when 
he  would  so  gladly  be  blotted  from  existence 
or  seek  rest  in  the  grave,  Eliphaz  feels  called 
upon  to  interpose  a  remonstrance.  He  makes 
an  endeavor  in  this  first  speech  to  rouse 
his  friend  from  this  utter  despondency,  to 
remind  him  of  the  moral  reasons  of  this 
terrible  infliction,  and  to  exhort  him  to  that 
more  complete  submission  which  would  be 
followed  by  the  return  of  God's  favor,  and  by 
more  than  his  former  prosperity. 

He  begins  in  an  apologetic  and  insinuat- 
ing strain :  "  If  we  assay  to  commune  with 
thee,  wdlt  thou  be  grieved  ?  but  who  can 
withhold  himself  from  speaking  ?  "  He  then 
proceeds  by  bidding  Job  remember  how  he 


JOBS    THREE    FRIENDS.  1 27 

had  strengthened  and  comforted  others  in 
their  affliction ;  and  he  ought  not  now  to 
show  weakness  himself.  As  a  good  and 
righteous  man,  he  should  not  despond,  but 
hope  in  God,  who  would  not  suffer  the  inno- 
cent to  perish,  nor  the  righteous  to  be  cut  off. 
As  to  the  source  of  his  troubles,  he  reminds 
him  of  the  universal  sinfulness  of  men.  Mor- 
tal man  cannot  be  just  in  the  sight  of  God, 
nor  man  pure  before  his  Maker.  Men  are 
sinners;  hence  their  frail  and  perishable 
nature.  They  are  crushed  before  the  moth, 
they  are  destroyed  from  morning  to  evening. 
Affliction  cometh  not  forth  from  the  dust, 
neither  doth  trouble  spring  out  of  the  ground. 
They  arise  from  no  extraneous  sources.  But 
man  is  born  to  trouble  as  the  sparks  fly  up- 
ward. He  is  involved  in  it  by  a  necessity  of 
his  nature :  it  springs  directly  out  of  his  in- 
born sinfulness.  Hence  he  admonishes  him 
to  submit  his  case  humbly  and  trustfully  to 
God,  under  whose  universal  and  righteous 
providence  the  poor  hath  hope,  and  iniquity 
is  compelled  to  stop   her  mouth.     "  He  shall 

6* 


128  job's  three  friends. 

deliver  thee  in  six  troubles  :  yea,  in  seven 
there  shall  no  evil  touch  thee."  And  he 
concludes  by  describing  in  beautiful  and 
impressive  terms  the  happy  consequences  of 
submissively  accepting  the  Lord's  correction. 
To  this  plausible  and,  rhetorically  con- 
sidered, elegant  address  of  Eliphaz,  there  are 
two  exceptions  to  be  taken.  In  the  first 
place,  it  could  not  but  grate  harshly  on  the 
ears  of  Job  that  his  friend  should  expect  him 
to  sustain  his  long-continued  and  bitter  suf- 
ferings with  equanimity,  and  that  he  should 
appear  to  reproach  him  with  not  himself  ex- 
hibiting that  fortitude  now  in  his  own  case 
which  he  had  inculcated  in  that  of  others. 
As  though  there  were  no  limits  to  human 
endurance,  and  it  were  possible  to  bear  up 
under  misery  like  his  without  a  word  of  com- 
plaint. The  sobs  and  groans  and  lamenta- 
tions wrung  from  him  by  an  anguish  too 
severe  to  be  quietly  endured  is  surely  a  weak- 
ness that  is  not  to  be  too  harshly  judged. 
And  the  appeal  to  Job's  piety,  as  though  this 
should   have  quieted  his  clamor  and  led  him 


JOBS    THREE    FRIENDS.  I  29 

still  to  maintain  a  cheerful  hope  amidst  his 
overwhelming  distress,  showed  a  want  of  con- 
sideration for  the  condition  in  which  he  then 
was.  There  was  in  all  this  a  lack  of  that 
tenderness  and  that  appreciative  sympathy 
which  was  a  prime  requisite  in  one  who 
would  comfort  such  a  mourner  as  Job. 

The  second  point  open  to  exception  in  the 
discourse  of  Eliphaz  is  not  a  matter  of  feeling, 
like  the  preceding,  but  of  principle.  It  is  the 
manner  in  which  he  represents  sin  and  suffer- 
ing as  linked  together  in  God's  providential 
dispensations,  as  though  this  afforded  an 
adequate  explanation  of  every  case  of  afflic- 
tion, Job's  included.  This  point  is  so  skil- 
fully put,  that  what  he  actually  says  can 
scarcely  be  objected  to  :  it  is  only  what  he 
implies,  by  offering  this  as  the  solution  of  the 
case  in  hand.  He  brings  no  harsh  or  doubt- 
ful charge  against  Job.  He  expresses  no 
suspicion,  and  apparently  entertains  none,  of 
the  depth  and  reality  of  his  piety.  His  plea 
is  rather  based  on  the  assumption  that  Job 
is  really  what  he  has  ever  been  supposed  to 


130  JOBS    THREE    FRIENDS. 

be  in  uprightness  and  the  devout  fear  of  God. 
He  lays  no  accusation  upon  him  but  such  as 
is  common  to  all  who  are  sharers  of  our 
degenerate  nature.  All  are  impure  in  the 
sight  of  God,  and  all  are  in  consequence 
born  to  trouble.  Exposure  to  suffering,  and 
suffering  itself,  being  an  inevitable  result  of 
that  corrupt  nature  with  which  we  were  born, 
the  wise  and  reasonable  course,  and  the  truly 
pious  course,  is  not  to  indulge  in  passionate 
outcries  against  the  divine  orderings,  which 
can  only  be  productive  of  harm  to  the  suf- 
ferer himself  (v.  2),  but  meekly  to  accept  and 
submit  to  the  sorrows  which  He  sends,  who 
maketh  sore  and  bindeth  up,  who  woundeth 
and  His  hands  make  whole.  Such  submis- 
sion will  surely  lead  to  peace  and  to  sal- 
vation. 

It  is  undoubtedly  true  that  where  there  is 
no  sin  there  will  be  no  suffering  among  the 
subjects  of  God's  moral  government.  All 
sufferinQT  has  sin  as  its  invariable  and  neces- 
sary  antecedent.  It  is  also  true  that  the 
consciousness  of  sin  and  ill-desert  must  for 


job's  three  friends.  131 

ever  close  the  mouth  of  every  sufferer  from 
any  well-grounded  complaint  against  the 
rio-hteousness  of  God.  The  holiest  and  the 
best  are  sinners  nevertheless  ;  and,  whatever 
sufferings  they  may  endure  in  the  providence 
of  God,  it  cannot  be  said  that  they  are  unjustly 
treated ;  for,  as  Zophar  states  this  point  in 
more  developed  form  to  Job,  "  God  exacteth 
of  thee  less  than  thine  iniquity  deserveth." 
xi.  6.  No  man's  sufferings  in  this  world  are 
equal  to  his  just  deserts. 

But,  while  this  is  true  and  incontestable, 
it  does  not  account  for  cases  of  special  and 
extraordinary  suffering,  and  especially  such 
as  occur  in  the  experience  of  good  men,  and 
such  as  that  to  which  it  is  here  applied.  The 
general  sinfulness  of  men  may  account  for 
human  sorrows  so  far  as  they  are  uniformly 
distributed;  and  a  like  principle  may  be 
applied  where  they  are  plainly  graduated  in 
proportion  to  the  demerit  of  the  sufferers. 
But  special  suffering,  not  involving  special 
o-uilt,  cannot  be  thus  accounted  for.  A  sin- 
fulness  common  to  all  cannot  be   the   reason 


132  JOBS    THREE    FRIENDS. 

why  one  is  singled  out  rather  than  another, 
and  made  to  endure  extraordinary  sorrows. 

The  special  significance  of  suffering,  there- 
fore, remains  unexplained.  Its  importance 
as  a  test  of  character,  its  value  as  a  means  of 
discipline  and  training,  and  the  far  more  ex- 
ceeding reward  by  which  it  shall  be  abun- 
dantly compensated,  are  not  once  suspected. 
Eliphaz  alleges  that  man  suffers  because  he 
is  a  sinner;  he  knew  not  that  a  man  may 
likewise  suffer  because  he  is  a  saint ;  that  he 
may  thus  exhibit  more  distinctly  his  saintly 
character ;  that  he  may  be  ripened  still  more 
in  holiness ;  and  that  his  final  recompense 
may  be  proportionably  increased.  Suffering, 
to  Eliphaz,  was  ever  and  only  a  punishment, 
a  judgment  for  sin,  an  infliction  of  the  divine 
displeasure.  He  knew  not  that  it  might  also 
be  a  token  of  love,  a  means  of  grace,  a  bless- 
ing in  disguise  ;  that  whom  the  Lord  loveth 
He  chasteneth,  and  scourgeth  every  son 
whom  He  receiveth. 

The  other  friends,  in  their  discourses,  fol- 
low Eliphaz  in  the  principles  and   method  of 


JOBS    THREE    FRIENDS.  1 33 

the  discussion,  only  with  increased  vehemence 
and  more  open  censure  of  Job.  Their  axiom 
is  that  God  cannot  deal  unjustly,  and  there- 
fore suffering  must  be  the  fruit  of  sin.  Bil- 
dad  intimates  that  Job's  children  had  but 
suffered  the  consequences  of  their  own  mis- 
deeds, so  that  this  loss  which  he  had  experi- 
enced was  the  result  of  sin,  not  his  own 
indeed,  but  theirs ;  and  he  puts  an  "  if " 
before  his  affirmation  of  the  piety  of  Job  him- 
self. "  If  thou  art  pure  and  upright,  and  wilt 
seek  unto  God  betimes,  and  make  thy  suppli- 
cation to  the  Almighty,  surely  He  will  awake 
for  thee,  and  make  thy  righteous  habitation 
prosperous."  Zophar  puts  the  "  if "  before 
the  contrary  hypothesis  as  to  Job's  character 
and  conduct,  implying  at  least  its  possibility. 
"  If  iniquity  be  in  thine  hand,  put  it  far  away, 
and  let  not  wickedness  dwell  in  thy  taber- 
nacles. For  then  shalt  thou  lift  up  thy  face 
without  spot ;  yea,  thou  shalt  be  steadfast,  and 
shalt  not  fear :  because  thou  shalt  forget  thy 
misery,  and  remember  it  as  waters  that  pass 
away  ;  and  thine  age  shall  be  clearer  than  the 


134  JO^S    THREE    FRIENDS. 

noonday :  thou  shalt  shine  forth,  thou  shalt 
be  as  the  morning."  The  vividness  and 
beauty  of  the  imagery  which  they  employ, 
and  the  force  and  vigor  of  their  expressions, 
cannot  fail  to  charm  and  to  impress,  however 
unsatisfactory  their  treatment  of  the  mystery 
with  which  they  deal,  however  unsound  or 
rather  one-sided  the  conclusions  to  which  they 
come,  and  however  unjust  and  ungenerous 
they  may  be  in  their  treatment  of  Job. 

When  Eliphaz  speaks  a  second  time,  it  is 
plain  that  he  has  undergone  a  considerable 
change  in  his  feelings  towards  Job.  He 
reasserts  the  fundamental  principle  common 
to  him  with  the  other  friends,  of  the  neces- 
sary connection  of  suffering  with  sin.  But 
he  no  longer  illustrates  or  defends  it  by  the 
consideration  of  the  universal  and  native  sin- 
fulness of  the  race.  It  is  not  of  man  as  "  born 
to  trouble  "  that  he  now  speaks,  so  much  as 
of  man  "  who  drinketh  iniquity  like  water." 
It  is  the  fate  of  the  ungodly  and  the  wicked 
man  that  he  holds  up  before  Job  for  his  warn- 
ing.   And  instead  of  presupposing  Job's  integ- 


JOBS    THREE    FRIENDS.  I  35 

rity,  and  urging  him  in  consequence  to  cherish 
the  hope  that  he  should  not  be  utterly  cut  off, 
he  charges  him  rather  with  serious  guilt ;  not, 
it  is  true,  with  criminal  misdeeds  or  acts  of  sin, 
but  with  wicked  words.  In  his  speeches  now 
uttered  in  the  presence  of  the  friends  he  has 
inculpated  himself.  He  has  maintained  prin- 
ciples and  uttered  expressions  inconsistent 
with  pious  reverence  for  God.  "  Thou  castest 
off  fear,  and  restrainest  prayer  before  God  ;  " 
that  is  to  say,  you  put  an  end  to  piety  and  an- 
nul the  value  of  prayer  by  the  sentiments  which 
you  have  here  propounded.  "  For  thy  mouth 
uttereth  thine  iniquity,  and  thou  choosest 
the  tongue  of  the  crafty.  Thine  own  mouth 
condemneth  thee,  and  not  I :  yea,  thine  own 
lips  testify  against  thee." 

Bildad  and  Zophar  once  more  follow 
Eliphaz  in  the  same  general  strain,  holding 
up  before  Job  the  destruction  that  is  certain, 
sooner  or  later,  to  overtake  the  ungodly,  and 
intimating,  not  obscurely,  that  this  is  the 
explanation  of  the  dismal  fate  which  has 
befallen  him. 


136  job's  three  friends. 

Eliphaz  in  his  third  discourse  makes  a  yet 
further  advance.  He  now,  without  any  am- 
biguity of  language  or  indirectness  of  intima- 
tion, expHcitly,  and  in  so  many  terms,  charges 
Job  with  the  most  atrocious  wickedness.  He 
has  become  more  and  more  estranged  from 
him  as  the  discussion  has  proceeded.  He 
has  become  more  and  more  convinced  from 
the  language  of  Job  himself  that  he  is  desti- 
tute of  real  piety,  until  at  length  all  his  for- 
mer confidence  in  him  has  utterly  vanished, 
and  he  not  only  believes  him  capable  of  any 
amount  of  wickedness,  but  is  persuaded  that 
he  has  actually  perpetrated  crimes  of  the  most 
serious  character,  and  that  the  sorrows  by 
which  he  has  so  suddenly  and  so  fearfully 
been  overwhelmed  are  thus  easily  accounted 
for. 

It  is  not  now  the  general  sinfulness  of 
human  nature  which  he  adduces  against  him 
as  in  his  first  discourse.  Nor  does  he  merely 
allege  the  language  of  impiety  and  irreverence 
to  be  found  in  his  speeches  which  he  had  here 
uttered   in   their  presence,  as  in  his  second 


JOBS    THREE    FRIENDS.  1 37 

discourse.  Nor  does  he  content  himself  with 
indirect  insinuations  and  impKcations  that 
his  fate  was  but  the  customary  fate  of  the 
wicked,  as  the  other  friends  had  already  done. 
But  he  goes  beyond  all  this,  and  makes  open 
and  direct  charges  of  habitual  and  gross 
transgression.  "  Is  not  thy  wickedness  great  ? 
and  thine  iniquities  infinite  ?  For  thou  hast 
taken  a  pledge  from  thy  brother  for  nought, 
and  stripped  the  naked  of  their  clothing. 
Thou  hast  not  given  water  to  the  weary  to 
drink,  and  thou  hast  withholden  bread  from^ 
the  hungry.  .  .  .  Thou  hast  sent  widows  away 
empty,  and  the  arms  of  the  fatherless  have 
been  broken.  Therefore  snares  are  round 
about  thee,  and  sudden  fear  troubleth  thee." 
A  just  and  all-seeing  God  has  detected  the 
villany  and  set  the  brand  of  His  reprobation 
upon  it.  Job  was  suffering  just  what  might 
be  expected  as  the  righteous  recompense  of 
the  iniquity  which  he  had  practised.  His 
fancied  impunity  is  now  at  an  end,  and  de- 
served vengeance  has  overtaken  him  at  last. 
What  a  spectacle  is  this !  and  what  a  les- 


138  job's  three  friends. 

son  it  reads  to  us !  This  man  is  one  whom 
God  declared  to  be  without  his  equal  for 
piety  in  the  earth,  —  perfect  and  upright,  and 
one  that  feared  God,  and  eschewed  evil.  And 
yet  here  are  good  men,  wise  men,  men  of 
age  and  experience,  his  friends  and  intimates 
through  many  former  years,  knowing  him 
not  merely  by  reputation  but  by  personal, 
familiar,  and  long  acquaintance,  who  do  not 
scruple  to  cherish  the  grossest  and  most  un- 
just suspicions,  and  actually  to  charge  upon 
him  the  most  egregious  misconduct.  And 
all  this  they  do  without  the  slightest  founda- 
tion in  actual  fact.  It  is  purely  inferential 
and  supposititious ;  nevertheless  they  charge 
it  upon  him  as  though  they  had  the  most 
undoubted  evidence  of  its  reality.  We  say 
again.  What  a  spectacle  !  and  what  a  lesson 
it  reads  to  us  ! 

The  friends  of  Job,  as  has  been  admitted 
already,  are  not  to  blame  for  not  knowing 
what  could  only  be  known  by  divine  revelation, 
and  had  not  then  been  revealed.  It  neither 
implies  any  obliquity  of  moral  vision,  nor  any 


JOBS    THREE    FRIENDS.  1 39 

dulness  of  intellectual  perception,  that  they 
were  unable  to  discern  the  true  intent  of  the 
sufferings  of  Job,  or  the  divine  purpose  in 
permitting  them.  This  was  a  secret  still 
undisclosed.  The  mystery  of  the  afflictions 
of  the  righteous  was  now  to  be  unveiled  as 
it  had  not  been  before  ;  and  the  sufferings  of 
Job  were  to  furnish  the  occasion,  by  the  les- 
sons to  be  divinely  communicated  in  connec- 
tion with  this  event.  But  this  was  not  to  be 
done  until  gifted  minds,  and  well  instructed 
in  the  general  truths  of  religion  before  made 
known,  had  first  employed  themselves  upon 
it,  and  shown  by  the  trial  the  incompetency 
of  unaided  reason  to  solve  the  riddle,  or  to 
dissipate  the  darkness  which  overhung  the 
dispensation.  The  ignorance  of  Job's  friends, 
and  of  Job  himself,  regarding  the  meaning 
and  design  of  God's  dealings  with  him,  was 
not  reprehensible.  This  could  not  have  been 
otherwise,  for  they  had  no  means  of  know- 
ing it. 

So  far  then  they  are  excusable.     But  what 
cannot   be    excused    in  them  is  that  in  the 


140  JOBS    THREE    FRIENDS. 

first  place  they  undertook  to  expound,  as 
though  they  had  full  knowledge  in  the  case, 
what  they  did  not  understand  ;  and  in  so 
doing  rested  the  divine  procedure  on  insuf 
ficient  reasons,  and  sought  to  square  it  by 
their  own  limited  notions.  If  they  had  con- 
fessed the  mystery  and  owned  their  ignorance 
regarding  it,  all  would  have  been  well.  They 
would  have  been  saved  from  their  subse- 
quent errors  and  mistakes,  and  from  the  gross 
injustice  of  which  they  were  guilty  towards 
Job.  By  acting  as  they  did,  they  in  fact 
arraigned  the  providence  of  God,  which  they 
were  professedly  defending.  They  prescribed 
a  rule  for  its  administration  as  the  only  one 
compatible  with  justice,  which  is  not,  after  all, 
the  method  which  it  actually  follows.  Suffer- 
ing is  not  distributed  according  to  the  ratio 
nor  on  the  principles  which  they  allege  to  be 
absolutely  demanded  by  God's  essential  attri- 
butes. By  defending  His  dispensations  on 
grounds  which  are  demonstrably  inadequate, 
and  insisting  that  these  are  the  grounds  on 
which    their    defence    must    necessarily    be 


job's  three  friends.  141 

rested,  they  do,  in  fact,  proclaim  that  these 
dispensations  are  indefensible ;  and  they  do 
their  utmost,  unwittingly  indeed,  but  no  less 
really,  to  bring  them  into  discredit. 

And  in  the  second  place  they  were  inex- 
cusable in  another  respect.  They  not  only 
entered  a  weak  and  unsuitable  plea  as  the 
only  one  upon  which  the  cause  of  God  could 
be  rested  or  His  providence  justified,  but  they 
likewise  undertook  to  bolster  up  His  cause 
by  a  disingenuous,  if  not  positively  immoral 
m.ethod.  As  Job  charges  upon  them  (xiii.  7), 
they  spoke  wickedly  for  God,  and  talked 
deceitfully  for  Him.  They  made  allegations 
which  they  had  no  means  of  knowing  to  be 
true,  and  which,  in  fact,  were  not  true :  they 
were  mere  inferences  from  the  false  premises 
on  which  they  w^ere  conducting  the  defence 
of  the  divine  government.  In  defending  the 
cause  of  religion  and  of  piety,  as  they  pro- 
fessed to  do,  they  were  guilty  of  making  rash 
and  reckless  assertions  ;  they  were  unjust  to 
Job  in  not  only  harboring  baseless  suspicions, 
but  in  venturing  upon  positive  declarations 


142  JOBS    THREE    FRIENDS. 

of  his  guilt  in  matters  of  which  he  was  wholly 
innocent ;  they  were  shamefully  cruel  to  their 
suffering  friend,  causelessly  aggravating  his 
distress,  which,  professedl}^  they  had  come  to 
soothe,  when  he  was  already  weighed  down 
by  troubles  that  might  have  disarmed  malice 
itself  and  softened  hearts  of  stone.  No  ex- 
igencies of  their  argument  could  justify  a 
course  like  this.  And  no  straits  in  which 
the  defence  of  God's  righteous  government 
and  the  claims  of  religion  seemed  to  be  could 
justify  it.  If  the  divine  administration  could 
not  be  honestly  and  truthfully  defended,  and 
without  a  resort  to  what^  is  questionable  or 
false,  they  should  have  retired  from  its  de- 
fence, and  concluded  that  they  were  not 
called  of  God  to  be  His  champions  in  this 
particular.  They  should  have  owned  the 
mystery  and  confessed  their  ignorance,  and 
waited  patiently  till  the  Lord  Himself  dis- 
closed the  impregnable  basis  on  which  He 
chose  to  have  His  cause  rested.  Confiding 
in  Him  who  doeth  great  things  and  unsearch- 
able, and  whose   ways   are   past  finding  out, 


JOBS    THREE    FRIENDS.  I43 

they  should  have  trusted  that  he  would  make 
all  plain  in  His  own  good  time,  instead  of 
presuming  to  put  forth  unholy  hands  to  sup- 
port the  ark  of  God,  and  darkening  His  in- 
finite counsel  by  words  without  knowledge. 

The  gross  charges  put  forth  by  Eliphaz 
could  not  be  repeated  by  Bildad  in  his  speech 
next  following,  in  the  face  of  Job's  solemn 
asseveration  of  his  innocence,  and  his  appeal 
to  the  omniscient  Judge  of  all.  He  accord- 
ingly recedes  from  them  entirely,  and  falls 
back  upon  the  original  position  of  Eliphaz  in 
his  opening  speech  ;  viz.,  the  universal  sinful- 
ness of  men,  in  which  Job  is  of  necessity 
involved.  He  thus  not  only  impliedly  re- 
tracts the  charges  hitherto  insinuated  or 
openly  made  against  Job,  but  concedes  his 
inability  to  conduct  the  argument  further. 
He  has  nothing  to  adduce  but  what  had  been 
adduced  and  answered  long  before.  The 
same  thing  is  likewise  intimated  by  the 
brevity  of  his  speech,  which  consists  of  but  a 
few  commonplace  sentences.  And  Zophar 
makes  no  attempt  to  speak  at  all.  He  has 
nothing  whatever  to  say. 


144  job's  three  friends. 


The  friends  accordingly  give  up  their 
argument  with  Job.  They  cannot  convince 
or  confute  him.  They  entered  their  protest 
against  his  complaint  in  his  wild  outburst  of 
grief.  They  sought  to  convict  him  of  the 
irreverence  and  impiety  of  which  they  thought 
him  guilty,  and  to  bring  him  back  to  what 
they  esteemed  right  views  and  a  proper 
spirit.  Instead  of  this  they,  in  point  of  fact, 
threw  themselves  upon  the  side  of  the  great 
adversary.  They  became  the  tools  and  ac- 
complices of  Satan  in  his  sore  temptation, 
giving  all  their  weight  to  the  scale  opposed 
to  God  and  goodness,  embittering  Job  against 
a  cause  which  was  upheld  by  such  disingenu- 
ous methods,  and  by  methods  so  unjust  to 
himself ;  casting  discredit  upon  God's  provi- 
dence, which  was  so  inadequately  defended 
and  justified  by  arguments  which  were  pal- 
pably false ;  and  tempting  Job  to  renounce 
the  service  of  God  Himself,  whom  they  repre- 
sented in  a  light  that  served  only  to  repel. 

The  question  has  now  reached  its  utmost 
intensity.      Can  Job   withstand   the  tempta- 


JOBS    THREE    FRIENDS.  1 45 

tlon,  which  is  brought  to  bear  upon  him  with 
all  this  accumulated  force  ?     With  his  prop- 
erty swept  away ;  his  children  gone  ;  himself 
the  victim  of  a  loathsome   and   painful  dis- 
order ;  his  very  wife  entreating  him  to  aban- 
don the  service  of  a  God  so  cruel,  the  author 
of  all  their  woes ;  his  agony,  both  of    body 
and  of  mind,  still  growing,  without  the  pros- 
pect of  release  ;  the  trusted  friends  of  former 
years  deserting  and  scorning  him,  and  sting- 
ing him  with  their  undeserved  reproaches ; 
while  he  is  himself  totally  unable  to  compre- 
hend the  righteousness  or  the  reasons  of  this 
dreadful  infliction,  —  can  he  bear  it  all  and  still 
maintain  his  trust  in  God,  who  hides  Himself 
in  such  awful  darkness  ?     The  answer  is  to 
be  found  in  Job's  successive  replies  to  his 
friends,  in  which  all  the  workings  of  his  soul 
in  this  fearful  crisis  are  so  vividly  and  faith- 
fully portrayed.     The  examination  of  these  re- 
plies must  be  deferred  until  another  chapter. 
Meanwhile,  may   He,   who    alone    can,  in 
mercy  uphold  and  comfort  all  His  tried  and 
suffering  saints.     Amen. 


CHAPTER  V. 


My  friends  scorn  me :  but  mine  eye  pour  eth  out 
tears  unto  God.  —  Job  xvi.  20. 


JOB^S    CONFLICT. 


Q^ATAN  now  has  his  train  completely  laid ; 
and  it  would  almost  seem  as  though  at 
length  he  has  his  victim  entirely  in  his  power, 
and  there  was  no  escape  out  of  the  fatal  snare. 
Job,  with  all  he  had,  was  put  at  the  disposal  of 
the  evil  one,  with  the  single  limitation  that  he 
must  spare  his  life.  And  Satan  has  used  the 
liberty  accorded  to  him  without  stint.  He 
has  brought  the  most  frightful  complication 
of  sorrows  and  sufferings  upon  the  unsus- 
pecting patriarch,  and  set  every  influence  at 
work  that  he  could  bring  to  bear  upon  him,  to 
overturn  his  integrity  and  detach  him  from 
the  service  of  God.  Can  he  succeed  in  his 
fiendish  purpose  ? 

He    has    crushed    the    spirits   of   Job,  and 


150  JOBS    CONFLICT. 

quenched  his  hopes.  He  has  accumulated 
pain  and  grief  upon  him,  until,  in  the  depth 
of  his  long-continued  anguish,  existence  itself 
has  become  an  insupportable  burden.  The 
weary  sufferer,  stunned,  bewildered,  tortured 
to  the  last  extreme  of  despair,  curses  the  day 
that  he  was  born,  and  longs  for  nothing  so 
much  as  to  die.  It  would  seem  as  though 
nature  could  hold  out  no  longer.  Satan  per- 
ceives his  advantage  in  this  crisis  of  Job's 
misery,  and  presses  it  relentlessly,  through  the 
medium  of  his  friends,  who  unwittingly  range 
themselves  on  the  tempter's  side.  These  pro- 
fessed ministers  of  consolation  and  advocates 
of  piety  treat  him  in  a  manner  which  embit- 
ters him  against  them  and  the  cause  which 
they  defend.  Their  pleas  for  the  equity  of 
the  divine  administration  are  repugnant  to 
his  sense  of  right,  and  to  the  testimony  of  his 
own  conscience.  They  represent  his  aggra- 
vated sufferings  as  a  righteous  retribution, 
either  for  the  sinfulness  inborn  in  our  common 
human  nature,  or  for  the  sin  betrayed  in  his 
present  irreverent  and  unsubmissive  speeches, 


JOBS    CONFLICT.  I5I 

or  for  the  guilt  of  some  gross  criminality  now 
first  detected  and  brought  to  light.  These 
assumptions  Job  repels  point  by  point.  His 
sufferings  cannot  be  so  explained.  What, 
then,  is  the  inevitable  alternative.'^  Is  not 
God  unrio^hteous  ?  is  He  not  treatino:  him 
as  an  offender,  when  He  knows  him  to  be 
innocent  .r*  Or  is  He  not  at  least  like  an 
implacable  foe,  mercilessly  and  gratuitously 
inflicting  upon  him  these  grievous  sorrows? 
If  w^oe  like  this  be  not  the  award  of  justice, 
must  it  not  be  injustice  or  wanton  cruelty  ? 
and,  if  God  be  either  unjust  or  pitiless,  how 
can  the  sufferer,  crushed  beneath  His  arbi- 
trary inflictions,  adore  or  trust  Him  ? 

Job's  triumph  is,  in  the  most  absolute  and 
unqualified  manner,  the  triumph  of  faith  over 
sense.  He  seems  to  outward  view  to  have  no 
ground  left  to  stand  upon.  Satan  has  appar- 
ently shut  him  up  to  conclusions  respecting 
the  providence  of  God,  which  positively  ex- 
clude worship  and  piety.  It  would  seem  as 
though  every  thing  conspired  to  show  that 
God  was  persecuting  him,  and   treating  him 


152  JOBS    CONFLICT. 

as  an  enemy.  Yet  from  an  angry  God  he 
can  turn  nowhere  but  back  to  God  Himself, 
in  whom  he  does  and  must  confide,  in  spite 
of  his  apparent  hostihty.  God  is  still  his 
only  refuge,  even  from  the  fierceness  of  His 
own  displeasure.  "  Though  He  slay  me,  yet 
will   I  trust  in   Him." 

Job's  triumph  was  not  easily  gained.  He 
was  indeed  hardly  beset  by  the  adversary. 
The  struggle  was  desperate,  and  tested  his 
constancy  to  the  utmost.  The  contest  was 
not  barely  one  of  fortitude,  of  capacity  to 
endure,  of  power  to  bear  up  under  calamities 
and  sufferings,  and  to  rise  superior  to  that 
terrible  combination  of  distresses  which  was 
weighing  him  down.  The  question  to  be 
settled  was  not  whether  Job  had  that  heroic 
firmness,  and  indomitable  self-mastery  and 
self-control,  or  rather  self-sufiiciency,  which 
was  the  Stoic's  ideal,  and  could  calmly  bear 
all  outward  losses,  and  support  undisturbed 
the  most  grievous  inflictions  of  pain  and  sor- 
row. His  trial  lay  in  a  totally  different  plane. 
The   point  of   it  was,  whether  he  would  still 


JOBS    CONFLICT.  I  53 

cleave  to  God  and  maintain  his  trust  in  Him, 
when  there  no  longer  remained  any  thing 
external  to  attract  him  to  His  service,  but 
every  thing  combined  to  repel  him  and  drive 
him  from  it. 

The  hand  of  God  was  in  these  dreadful 
sorrows.  Why  had  He  sent  them,  or  per- 
mitted them.r^  The  Christian  can  readily 
answer  this  question,  and  can  comprehend 
without  difficulty  how  afflictions  are  consist- 
ent with  the  divine  goodness  and  love.  But 
the  revelations  which  shed  such  a  cheerful 
light  for  us  upon  this  mysterious  subject  had 
not  then  been  given.  Job  was  left  to  con- 
front the  difficulty,  with  no  help  afforded  him 
for  its  solution.  He  was  in  utter  darkness 
and  perplexity,  and  unable  to  apprehend  the 
reasons  of  the  dispensation.  And  the  only 
solution  which  offered  itself,  and  towards 
which  he  was  persistently  driven  by  antago- 
nism to  the  inadmissible  position  urged  upon 
him  by  his  friends,  was  not  reconcilable  with 
the  goodness  or  justice  of  God.  Hence  the 
tumult  of  his  soul,  and  the  tempest  of  con- 


154  JOBS    CONFLICT. 

flicting  emotions  which  rages  within  him. 
Reason  and  sense  urge  him  in  one  direction, 
and  the  strono:  recoil  of  faith  drives  him  back 
in  the  other;  and  thus  he  is  swayed  perpetu- 
ally to  and  fro,  still  hoping  against  hope,  ever 
afresh  seeking  unto  God  w^ho  had  cast  him 
off,  unable  to  release  himself  from  the  toils 
which  Satan  had  so  artfully  woven  around 
him,  yet  continuing  to  struggle,  and  never 
submitting  to  be  captured ;  unable  to  escape 
from  conclusions  to  which  the  logic  of  his 
sufferings  seemed  to  constrain  him,  or  to  ban- 
ish the  forbidding  spectre  of  an  angry  God 
which  they  perpetually  raise  before  him,  and 
yet  holding  fast  to  his  inmost  convictions,  in 
spite  of  all  that  seems  to  contradict  them. 

This  inward  struggle  of  Job  is  not  made 
the  subject  of  any  formal  description  ;  but  it 
is  vividly  depicted  in  his  successive  speeches 
in  reply  to  his  friends.  These  lay  bare  all 
the  workings  of  his  soul,  and  the  fearful 
agitation  which  was  going  on  within  him. 
They  disclose  the  terrible  conflict  through 
which  he  was  passing,  in   its  various   phases, 


JOBS    CONFLICT.  I  55 

until  out  of  the  depths  of  despair  he  fought 
his  way  to  soHd  peace.  They  show  into  what 
distress  the  tempter  plunged  him  ;  what 
gloom  and  darkness  had  settled  upon  his 
path  ;  to  what  spiritual  straits  he  was  reduced ; 
but  how  in  spite  of  all  he  never  abandoned 
his  faith  in  God.  He  staggered  and  tot- 
tered under  the  tremendous  blows  which 
were  given  him,  and  it  seemed  at  times  as 
though  he  could  not  recover  himself,  and 
must  fall.  But  somehow  he  always  regained 
his  footing,  and  never  lost  his  balance  en- 
tirely. The  adversary  was  foiled,  notwith- 
standing all  his  arts  and  all  the  weapons  he 
employed.  And  the  piety  of  Job,  which  he 
sought  to  undermine  or  to  destroy,  sustained 
the  test,  and  triumphed  in  the  encounter. 

Job's  opening  speech,  in  which  he  first 
breaks  silence  and  pours  forth  his  piteous 
plaint  of  woe,  is  a  soliloquy.  It  is  the  melan- 
choly wail  of  insupportable  anguish.  It  is 
the  frantic  outburst  of  grief,  which  has  been 
held  in  until  it  can  no  longer  be  repressed, 
and  to  which  he   now  gives  vent,  apparently 


156  job's  conflict. 

unconscious  that  any  one  is  present,  bemoan- 
ing himself  without  the  thought  of  being 
overheard.  The  burden  of  his  speech  is  the 
misery  of  this  intolerable  existence :  Oh  that 
I  had  never  lived!  Oh  that  now  I  might 
cease  to  be  ! 

When  Eliphaz  and  the  other  friends  under- 
take to  address  him,  reproving  him  for  his 
want  of  submission,  justifying  the  dispensa- 
tion under  which  he  suffers,  and  pointing  out 
what  they  conceive  to  be  the  true  method  of 
relief.  Job  directs  his  replies  partly  to  them 
and  partly  to  God.  He  speaks  to  his  friends 
with  the  double  aim  of  exciting  their  pity  and 
replying  to  their  arguments.  What  he  says 
to  God  is  likewise  of  a  twofold  character :  he 
both  wrestles  with  God,  in  the  way  of  expos- 
tulation for  the  misery  which  He  has  inflicted 
upon  him,  and  he  affirms  his  confidence  in 
Him.  It  is  in  these  addresses  to  God  that  his 
inward  agony  most  fully  asserts  itself ;  that 
the  antasfonistic  emotions  with  which  his  soul 
is  rent  asunder  meet  in  the  sharpest  contrast 
and   collision;    and    that    he    undergoes    the 


JOBS    CONFLICT.  I57 

greatest    and    most    sudden    transitions    of 
feeling. 

The    progress    and    the    stages   of    Job's 
inward  strife  are  very  plainly  marked.     His 
ineffectual  appeals  to  his  friends  for  the  sym- 
pathy which  they  deny  him   throw  him  back 
more  and  more  upon  God,  as  his  only  source 
of  help.     Refused  the  pity  that  he  craves  on 
earth,  he  can   look  nowhere  but  to  Heaven, 
and   is  forced   to   seek  his  only  refuge  there. 
Accordingly,   that  which  overwhelmingly  oc- 
cupies his  mind  in  the  first  instance  is  the 
relation  between  himself  and  God.     Is   God 
his   Enemy,  or  is   He  his  Friend  ?     Despair 
and  hope  struggle  for  the  mastery,  and  the 
conflict  grows   more   and  more  intense  until 
the  climax  is  reached  at  the  central  point  of 
the  discussion  between   him  and  his  friends. 
Corresponding  to  the  three  series  of  speeches 
addressed  to   Job  by  his  three  friends,   who 
follow   each    other    in    the    same    invariable 
order,    are    the    three    series    of    his    replies 
severally  addressed    to    them.       Throughout 
the  first  series   of  Job's   rejoinders,  and  into 


158  job's  conflict. 

the  middle  of  the  second  the  conflict  in  his 
soul  continues  to  heighten,  until  in  his  sec- 
ond reply  to  his  second  friend,  Bildad,  it 
attains  its  acme.  Here  the  opposing  princi- 
ples come  to  their  most  intense  encounter. 
His  sense  of  the  hostility  of  God  to  him 
reaches  its  most  vivid  and  vehement  expres- 
sion, but  is  immediately  succeeded  and  swal- 
lowed up  by  the  conviction  which  overspreads 
his  soul  of  the  certainty  of  God's  friendship 
and  favor,  which,  though  the  worst  comes  to 
the  worst,  must  and  will  manifest  itself,  here- 
after if  not  now,  in  the  world  to  come,  if  not 
in  this.  With  this  burst  of  triumph  the 
temptation  is  trodden  under  foot.  Satan  is 
vanquished,  and  Job's  inward  conflict  is  sub- 
stantially over.  Faith  has  gotten  the  victory. 
He  has  Q:ained  the  assurance  that  God  is  his 
Redeemer,  come  what  may  and  in  spite  of 
all  adverse  appearances.  And  with  this  the 
whole  power  of  the  temptation  is  broken. 

The  darkness  is  not  dispersed.  The 
mystery  of  the  dispensation  is  no  nearer  its 
solution.      The    enigma    remains,  and    is    as 


JOBS    CONFLICT.  I  59 

inexplicable  as  ever.  Why  he  has  been 
made  to  suffer  or  allowed  to  suffer  so  terribly 
he  does  not  know.  He  has  not  the  faintest- 
idea  of  the  reasons  of  the  infliction.  He 
does  not  discern  how  it  is  to  be  reconciled 
wdth  the  goodness  of  God,  or  His  righteous- 
ness, or  His  favor  towards  himself.  But  he 
has  laid  hold  of  the  fact  \vith  the  strong 
grasp  of  faith.  He  is  assured  that  God  is 
his  Redeemer  and  his  Friend  ;  and  his 
confident  trust  does  not  again  give  way. 
Notwithstanding  the  continuance  of  his  suf- 
ferinors  and  the  difficulties  that  encumber 
their  explanation,  he  is  now^  on  the  solid  rock. 
The  floods  may  dash  around  him,  but  they 
cannot  break  over  him  ;  and  he  is  no  longer 
in  peril  of  being  overwhelmed. 

Having  thus  reached  comparative  peace, 
and  settled  the  question  which  chiefly  agi- 
tated him  hitherto,  —  of  his  relation  to  God,  — 
Job  next  turns  his  attention  more  immediately 
to  his  controversy  with  his  friends.  He  has 
denied  the  truth  of  their  position  before,  and 
stated  facts   at  variance  with   it ;   but   in   his 


i6o  job's  conflict. 

I 

subsequent  speeches,  viz.,  the  last  of  the 
second  series  and  in  those  of  the  third  series, 
he  refutes  their  position  by  reviewing  their 
arguments  in  detail,  and  he  shows  that  they 
have  furnished  no  adequate  or  satisfactory 
account  whether  of  God's  providence  in  gen- 
eral  or  of  his  sorrows  in  particular. 

Having  thus  hastily  sketched  in  outline 
the  current  of  Job's  feelings  toward  God  and 
his  attitude  toward  his  friends,  we  may  now 
return  to  take  a  more  deliberate  survey  of  his 
several  speeches,  with  the  view  of  noting  more 
minutely  his  demeanor  at  each  successive 
step  of  his  great  struggle. 

In  his  first  reply  to  Eliphaz,  Job  is  in  the 
same  state  of  unrelieved  despair  as  in  his 
opening  complaint.  The  poor  alleviation 
even  of  the  sympathy  of  his  friends  had  been 
denied  him,  and  he  bitterly  upbraids  them  for 
withholding  that  pity  which  was  so  needful 
to  him  in  his  distressed  situation,  and  would 
have  cost  them  so  little.  Eliphaz  had  re- 
minded him  of  the  infinite  greatness  of  God, 
and  of  the  feebleness   and  frailty  of  sinful 


job's  conflict.  i6i 

man,  and  urged  these  as  reasons  why  he 
should  be  submissive  under  his  sufferinQ^s. 
To  Job's  mind  these  are  but  an  aggravation 
of  his  misery  and  a  fresh  justification  of  his 
complaint.  He  had  but  one  brief  life  to  live, 
and  this  was  filled  up  with  weariness  and 
woe.  "  Therefore,"  he  says,  "  I  will  not  re- 
frain my  mouth ;  I  will  speak  in  the  anguish 
of  my  spirit ;  I  will  complain  in  the  bitter- 
ness of  my  soul."  And  he  converts  these 
into  pleas  with  the  Almighty  that  he  would 
mitigate  the  severity  of  his  treatment.  He 
was  too  insignificant  and  frail,  sinner  though 
he  was,  to  deserve  or  to  require  such  terrible 
constancy  of  attention  from  the  infinite  God. 
It  was  making  too  much  of  a  creature  so  tri- 
fling and  so  powerless,  that  he  should  be  so 
fearfully  visited,  and  made  a  mark  at  which 
God  was  always  directing  His  shafts,  and 
never  allowed  a  moment's  respite  day  or 
night,  when  he  would  shortly  sleep  in  the 
dust  and  cease  to  be. 

There  does  not  appear  to  be  a  single  ray 
of    comfort  nor  a   gleam    of    hope    for  the 


1 62  job's  conflict. 

stricken   sufferer   in   the   present  or  the   fu- 
ture, from  man  or  from  God.     But  from  this 
abyss  of  darkness  and  cheerless  despondency 
he  struggles  constantly  upward  towards  the 
.light.       In    each    successive    speech     some 
slight  advance  is  made ;  there  is  each   time 
some  fresh  reaching  out  towards  help  or  hope. 
Every  address  made  by  his  friends  shows  him 
more  and  more  plainly  that  nothing  is  to  be 
looked  for  or  expected  from  them :  they  still 
persist  in  refusing  to  him  even  that  measure 
of  relief    or  consolation  which  human   sym- 
pathy might  supply.     Cut  off  from  all  earthly 
assistance  or  even  pity,  there  is  no  one   but 
God  to  whom  he  can  have  recourse.     And 
here  he  is  torn  by  conflicting  feelings.     God 
is  persecuting  and  afflicting  him,  and,  to  all 
outward  appearance,  is  treating  him   as    an 
enemy.     And    still    he    cannot   let   go    that 
inward  persuasion,  which  manifests  itself  at 
first  but  dimly,  and  yet  grows  in  clearness 
and  strength  as  he  recurs  to  it,  that  God  will 
not  altogether  withhold  his  favor  from  him. 
Each  time  that  he  essays  to  speak,  sense  and 


job's  conflict.  163 

faith  stand  in  blank  antagonism.  His  suffer- 
ings press  overwhelmingly  upon  him  with 
their  apparent  evidence  that  God  is  against 
him.  But  Faith  comes  with  its  whispers, 
scarcely  audible,  and  yet  refusing  to  be 
stifled,  that  God  must  nevertheless  be  on 
his  side. 

These  suggestions  of  his  unquenched  con- 
fidence in  God  are  only  hypothetical  at  first. 
If  such  an  obstacle  were  only  removed,  or  if 
such  a  condition  could  only  exist,  then  God 
would  surely  manifest  Himself  in  his  favor. 
But  the  obstacle  remains  ;  the  condition  is 
impossible  to  be  realized ;  and  so  he  sinks 
back  each  time  into  a  state  of  unrelieved  de- 
spondency and  gloom.  But  his  despair  is  no 
longer  absolute  and  total.  These  suggestions 
of  faith  and  hope  gradually  assume  a  more 
definite  form,  and  take  upon  themselves  more 
reality.  They  gain  in  strength,  and  come  to 
a  fuller  utterance  with  each  successive  re- 
sponse he  makes  to  his  friends,  until  at  last 
they  grow  into  a  clear  and  decided  conviction, 
which  dissipates  the  clouds  of  despondency, 


164  job's  conflict. 

breaks  through  the  toils  which  the  adversary 
has  thrown  around  him,  and  vanquishes  the 
temptation  completely  and  forever  by  the 
language  of  triumphant  assurance,  "  I  know 
that  my  Redeemer  liveth." 

In  the  reply  to  Bildad,  the  second  of  the 
friends,  we  see  the  first  budding  of  this  rising 
hope,  the  first  glimmer  of  the  coming  dawn. 
We  there  find  the  earliest  suggestion  of  a 
more  favorable  issue  ;  but  it  is  a  suggestion 
clogged  with  an  impossible  condition,  and 
which  cannot  be  realized  in  the  form  in 
which  it  presents  itself  to  his  mind.  If  he 
could  but  speak  with  God  on  equal  terms, 
if  God  would  lay  aside  His  infinite  majesty 
and  divest  Himself  of  His  awful  terrors,  then 
he  would  present  his  case  before  Him  and  it 
would  be  acceptably  heard,  and  he  would  be 
vindicated  by  his  Judge.  But  how  is  such  a 
hearing  to  be  obtained }  "  He  is  not  a  man, 
as  I  am,  that  I  should  answer  him,  and  we 
should  come  together  in  judgment.  Neither 
is  there  any  days-man  betwixt  us,  that  might 
lay  his  hand  upon  us  both."     He  neverthe- 


job's  conflict.  165 

less  pours  forth  his  expostulation  with  God, 
pleading  with  Him  for  His  righteousness' 
sake  and  for  His  past  mercies,  upon  which 
he  fondly  dwells,  not  to  destroy  him.  "  I  will 
say  unto  God,  Do  not  condemn  me.  Is  It 
good  unto  Thee  that  Thou  shouldest  oppress, 
that  Thou  shouldest  despise  the  work  of  Thine 
hands,  and  shine  upon  the  counsel  of  the 
wicked.^" 

When  Zophar,  the  last  of  the  friends, 
speaks.  It  is  in  the  same  strain  with  those 
who  had  preceded  him,  only  with  greater 
harshness  and  impetuosity.  If  Job  had 
entertained  a  lingering  expectation  of  pity 
or  even  justice  from  at  least  one  of  his 
friends,  this  Is  now  gone.  And  he  retorts 
in  terms  of  bitter  and  Indignant  rebuke  for 
their  arrogant  conceit  in  adducing  the  famil- 
iar common-places  of  God's  rectitude  and 
justice,  as  though  they  were  an  adequate 
solution  of  the  mysteries  of  His  providence. 
These  rest  on  totally  different  and  as  yet 
unexplained  grounds.  They  were  undertak- 
ino:  to  vindicate  God's  providence  In  a  man- 


1 66  job's  conflict. 

ner  which  would  not  be  sanctioned  by  God 
Himself.  They  were  justifying  the  dealings 
of  God  by  false  and  unfounded  assumptions. 
They  were  in  fact  impugning  the  righteous- 
ness of  God,  which  they  professed  to  defend, 
for  they  suspended  its  defence  on  the  as- 
sumption that  He  invariably  acted  on  prin-' 
ciples,  upon  which  He  did  not  even  ordinarily 
act  in  His  administration  of  human  affairs,  and 
upon  which  Job  knew  from  his  own  inward 
consciousness  He  was  not  acting  in  the  pres- 
ent instance.  He  was  confident,  therefore, 
that  God  would  declare  in  his  favor  and  not 
in  theirs.  He  was  sure  of  a  vindication,  if 
his  case  could  only  come  before  God.  And 
his  mind  recurs  again  to  the  same  twofold 
obstruction  as  before ;  and  the  hypothesis  of 
its  removal,  though  doubtful  and  distant,  does 
not  seem  so  absolutely  impossible  as  before. 
"  Only  do  not  two  things  unto  me.  With- 
draw Thine  hand  far  from  me :  and  let  not 
Thy  dread  make  me  afraid.  Then  call  Thou, 
and  I  will  answer:  or  let  me  speak,  and 
answer  Thou  me." 


job's  conflict.  167 

But  the  sense  of  his  misery  returns  upon 
him,  and  of  his  hfe  almost  at  an  end,  cut 
off  amidst  his  hopeless  sufferings  ;  and  what 
possibility  remains  of  a  divine  vindication  ? 
"  There  is  hope  of  a  tree,  if  it  be  cut  down, 
that  it  will  sprout  again,  and  that  the  tender 
branch  thereof  will  not  cease.  But  man 
dieth,  and  waste th  away :  yea,  man  giveth 
up  the  ghost,  and  where  is  he  ?  As  the 
waters  fail  from  the  sea,  and  the  flood  de- 
cayeth  and  drieth  up :  so  man  lieth  down, 
and  riseth  not :  till  the  heavens  be  no  more, 
they  shall  not  awake,  nor  be  raised  out  of 
their  sleep."  Oh  if  it  were  otherwise !  If 
death  were  but  a  temporary  suspension  of 
his  earthly  life !  If  he  could  go  down  to  the 
grave  for  a  season,  until  God's  favor  w^ere 
restored  to  him,  and  then  could  return  to 
the  land  of  the  living  and  come  back  to  his 
former  abode,  he  would  patiently  bear  all 
that  was  laid  upon  him  now.  "  Oh  that  Thou 
wouldest  hide  me  in  the  grave,  that  Thou 
wouldest  keep  me  secret  until  Thy  wrath  be 
past,  that  Thou  wouldest   appoint  me  a   set 

8 


1 68  job's  conflict. 

time,  and  remember  me !  If  man  could  die 
and  then  live  again,  all  the  days  of  my  ap- 
pointed time  would  I  wait  till  my  change 
come,"  my  restoration  from  death  to  life. 

Job  is  trembling  here  on  the  verge  of  a 
hope  full  of  immortality,  which  is  soon  to 
assume  its  proper  form  before  his  mind  and 
to  swell  to  its  just  dimensions.  But  it  is  as 
yet  only  inadequately  conceived  by  him.  A 
conscious  state  of  existence  beyond  the  grave 
was  part  of  the  faith  of  the  early  patriarchs, 
who  looked  forward  to  being  "  gathered  to 
their  fathers."  But  the  future  state  was  then 
revealed  only  in  the  most  dim  and  shadowy 
outline.  It  was  to  them  an  unseen  and 
unknown  world  ;  no  bright  and  joyous  antici- 
pations were  connected  with  it,  no  clear 
disclosures  had  yet  been  made  regarding  it. 
The  bare  fact  of  its  reality  was  almost  all 
that  was  known.  The  veil  was  about  to  be 
lifted  to  the  wrestling  soul  of  Job  further 
than  it  had  ever  been  raised  to  human  eyes 
before.  The  lesson  of  his  immortality  was 
one   of  special   value   for   his    present    need. 


job's  conflict.  169 

*  And  he  is  here  darkly  and  vaguely  feeling 
after  it,  and  reaching  out  towards  it.  In  all 
his  speeches  hitherto  the  grave  has  been  the 
end  of  all  that  he  expected  or  hoped  for,  —  not, 
we  may  assume,  the  end  of  being  and  con- 
scious spiritual  existence,  but  of  life  in  any 
desirable  sense.  He  had  no  anticipations 
of  good  in  the  grave  or  beyond  it,  no  thought 
of  blessedness  in  another  state,  which  could 
outweigh  or  alleviate  his  present  sorrows. 
All  his  notions  of  the  future  were  negative. 
He  conceived  of  it  simply  as  a  state  of  priva- 
tion of  all  earthly  good.  He  had  no  idea  of 
the  positive  blessings  belonging  to  it,  of  its 
bliss  and  glory  and  beatific  vision  of  God. 
He  looked  downward  to  Sheol,  the  land  of 
ghosts  and  shades,  not  upward  to  heaven, 
the  abode  of  glorified  spirits  in  the  immedi- 
ate presence  of  God  Himself. 

The  mists  that  shrouded  the  future  world 
were  never  taken  completely  away  until 
Jesus  Christ  abolished  death,  and  brought 
life  and  immortality  to  light  through  the 
gospel.     The  apostles  and  disciples  of  Christ 


170  JOBS    CONFLICT. 

stand  in  an  entirely  different  attitude  to  the 
future  world,  and  hold  a  different  language 
respecting  it  from  the  saints  of  God,  who 
preceded  his  coming.  The  consciousness 
that  to  die  is  gain,  the  desire  to  depart  as 
far  better  than  to  abide  in  the  flesh,  belongs 
wholly  to  the  New  Testament :  it  has  no 
parallel  in  the  Old.  Nevertheless,  preliminary 
lessons  of  great  value  were  already  given 
under  the  former  dispensation.  And  one 
of  the  first  gleams  of  heavenly  light  sent  to 
irradiate  the  darkness  of  the  grave  is  found 
in  this  book  of  Job.  It  is  born  of  an 
assurance  graciously  vouchsafed  to  his  soul 
as  he  struggles  with  his  terrible  tempta- 
tion. 

In  all  that  he  had  said  hitherto  of  death, 
it  has  been  spoken  of  as  terminating  every 
hope  and  every  joyful  prospect.  "  As  the 
cloud  is  consumed  and  vanisheth  away :  so  he 
that  goeth  down  to  the  grave  shall  come  up 
no  more.  He  shall  return  no  more  to  his 
house,  neither  shall  his  place  know  him.  any 
more"  (vii.  9,  10).     "  I  go  whence  I  shall  not 


JOB  S    CONFLICT.  I  7  I 

return,  even  to  the  land  of  darkness,  and  the 
shadow  of  death  ;  a  land  of  darkness,  as  dark- 
ness itself;  and  of  the  shadow  of  death,  with- 
out any  order,  and  where  the  light  is  as 
darkness"  (x.  21,  22).  But  in  the  speech  to 
Zophar  upon  which  we  are  now  remarking, 
he  ventures  the  hypothetical  suggestion  of  a 
return  as^ain  to  life  from  the  dead.  If  that 
were  only  possible,  it  would  relieve  the  gloom 
of  this  dark  dispensation  under  which  he  is 
suffering.  It  would  allay  the  strife,  which 
now  rages  in  his  soul,  between  his  convic- 
tion that  God  will  declare  on  his  behalf,  and 
the  outward  appearance  as  though  God  were 
his  foe.  It  would  open  the  way  to  a  recon- 
ciliation between  these  seeming  contradic- 
tions. It  would  afford  an  opportunity  for 
the  divine  favor,  of  which  he  was  inwardly 
assured,  still  to  manifest  itself  to  him.  In 
the  precise  form  in  which  this  vague  sug- 
gestion has  arisen  in  his  mind,  it  cannot  be 
realized.  This  earthly  life  cannot  again  be 
renewed.  And  with  this  impossibility  he 
relapses  again  into  his  former  state  of  cheer- 


172  JOBS    CONFLICT. 

less  despondency.  But  the  germ  of  hope  is 
there,  \yhich  will  soon  unfold  itself  in  a  more 
practicable  form  to  the  assured  conviction  of 
God's  favor  manifested  to  him  in  a  future 
life. 

The  temptation  is  now  approaching  its 
crisis ;  and  Job's  inward  conflict  is  becom- 
ing more  and  more  intense.  In  his  next 
two  speeches  he  says  little,  almost  nothing, 
to  his  friends.  He  merely  in  a  few  words  at 
the  beginning  gives  vent  to  his  impatience 
at  their  unfeeling  speeches,  and  begs  them  to 
desist  and  torture  him  no  longer.  He  makes 
no  reply  to  their  arguments,  but  turns  from 
them  to  God  and  pours  forth  all  the  agitation 
of  his  soul  before  Him.  Despair  and  hope 
alternate  in'  his  bosom,  and  the  struggle  is  a 
fearful  one  indeed.  His  agony  and  inward 
distress  are  at  their  highest  point,  and  are 
reflected  in  the  vehemence  ^nd  even  pas- 
sionate character  of  his  expressions.  He  is 
bowed  down  by  the  sense  of  God's  anger  as 
apparently  shown  in  these  terrible  inflictions. 
"  He  teareth  me  in  His  wrath,  who  hateth  me : 


JOBS    CONFLICT.  I  73 

He  gnasheth  upon  me  with  His  teeth ;  .  .  . 
I  was  at  ease,  but  He  hath  broken  me 
asunder  :  He  hath  also  taken  me  by  my  neck, 
and  shaken  me  to  pieces  and  set  me  up  for 
His  mark.  His  archers  compass  me  round 
about,  He  cleaveth  my  reins  asunder,  and 
doth  not  spare ;  He  poureth  out  my  gall 
upon  the  ground.  He  breaketh  me  with 
breach  upon  breach,  He  runneth  upon  me 
like  a  giant.  .  .  .  My  face  is  foul  with  weep- 
ing, and  on  my  eyelids  is  the  shadow  of 
death." 

And  all  this,  as  his  inward  consciousness 
of  integrity  and  his  total  inability  to  compre- 
hend why  God  should  have  treated  him  thus, 
prompt  him  to  exclaim,  "  Not  for  any  injus- 
tice in  mine  hands :  also  my  prayer  is  pure." 
Such  violent  treatment,  which  he  has  no  con- 
sciousness of  having  deserved,  dealing  with 
him  as  though  he  were  a  gross  offender,  which 
he  was  not,  and  carrying  the  infliction  even 
to  the  point  of  destroying  his  life,  extorts 
from  him  the  passionate  outcry  as  from  the 
victim  of  atrocious  injury  :    "  O  earth,  cover 


174  JOBS    CONFLICT. 

not  thou  my  blood,  and  let  my  cry  have 
no  place."  I  must  die,  but  it  is  unrighteous 
murder.  Let  the  earth  refuse  to  drink  in 
my  blood  thus  unjustly  shed,  so  that  it  may 
remain  forever  exposed,  a  constant  witness  to 
the  terrible  wrong  perpetrated  upon  me  ;  and 
let  my  death-cry  never  be  hushed  to  silence, 
but  resound  forever  in  testimony  of  the  cruel 
violence  under  which  I  suffer.  I  die,  unable 
lono^er  to  sustain  these  dreadful  inflictions 
which  God  is  bringing  upon  me ;  but  I 
die,  protesting  against  the  injustice  and  the 
outrage. 

Has  Satan  then  gained  his  end,  and  has 
Job  at  length  fallen  into  the  snare  ?  In  the 
frightful  darkness,  which  has  to  outward  view 
obscured  the  evidence  of  God's  rectitude,  has 
Job  given  up  his  sense  of  that  rectitude  ?  Is 
his  confidence  in  God's  eternal  justice  gone  ? 
Then  has  he  indeed  been  driven  to  that 
renunciation  of  God's  service  to  which  Satan 
has  been  relentlessly  endeavoring  to  force 
him. 

But  no  !    In  all  this  agony  and  darkness 


JOBS    CONFLICT.  I  75 

and  inexplicable  mystery,  Job  cannot  let  go 
his  ineradicable  trust  in  God.  Brought,  as 
it  might  seem  that  he  was,  almost  to  the 
point  of  abandoning  it,  the  strength  of  that 
trust  only  becomes  more  conspicuous  from 
the  strain  to  which  it  has  been  subjected. 
By  its  powerful  recoil  it  carries  him  sud- 
denly back  from  the  verge  of  the  abyss  to 
the  immovable  foundation.  The  faith  that 
seemed  to  be  vanishing,  if  it  had  not  already 
vanished,  rises  unexpectedly  superior  over 
all  the  tumult  of  his  soul,  and  all  depress- 
ing circumstances.  From  his  frantic  outcry 
against  the  injustice  that  is  slaying  him, 
he  passes  to  the  instant  expression  of  his 
unabated  trust  in  God.  "  Also  now,  behold, 
my  witness  is  in  heaven,  and  my  record  is  on 
high.  My  friends  scorn  me :  but  mine  eye 
poureth  out  tears  unto  God."  Only  the  infi- 
nite exaltation  of  the  Most  High  still  inter- 
poses its  impassable  obstruction,  and  places 
him  at  such  a  remove  that  his  case  cannot 
be   adequately   brought   before    God    to    be 

8* 


176  job's  conflict. 

rectified.  And  yet  he  pleads  with  God, 
who  alone  will  or  can,  to  be  his  surety  and 
take  his  part.  All  others  have  deserted  him. 
All  others  misunderstand  his  character  and 
misinterpret  his  condition.  God  is  his  only 
refuge.  But,  under  the  returning  sense  of 
his  misery  and  approaching  end,  he  sinks 
once  more  at  the  close  of  his  speech  into 
a  cheerless  and  despondent  frame. 

But  the  victory  for  which  he  has  been 
struggling  is  now  near  at  hand.  The  ele- 
ments of  hope,  which  have  been  gathering 
in  his  soul,  have  attained  a  consistency, 
which  will  make  them  superior  in  the  strife. 
And  his  trust  in  God  is  preparing  to  assert 
itself  invincibly,  though  deprived  of  all  exter- 
nal supports  and  in  the  face  of  all  opposi- 
tion from  outward  sense. 

The  more  particular  examination  of  the 
language  of  his  triumph  will  occupy  another 
chapter. 

Now  unto  Him  that  kept  Job  from  falling, 
and  who  is  able  likewise  to  keep  us  from 


JOBS    CONFLICT.  1 77 

falling,  and  to  present  us  faultless  before  the 
presence  of  His  glory  with  exceeding  joy,  to 
the  only  wise  God  our  Saviour  be  glory  and 
majesty,  dominion  and  power,  both  now  and 
ever.     Amen. 


CHAPTER  VI. 


For  I  know  that  my  Redeemer  liveth^  and  that 
He  shall  sta^id  at  the  latter  day  upo7i  the  earth  ;  and 
though  after  my  skin  worms  destroy  this  body,  yet 
in  my  flesh  shall  I  see  God:  whom  I  shall  see  for 
myself  and  mine  eyes  shall  behold^  and  not  another ; 
though  m,y  reins  be  consumed  within  me,  —  Job  xix. 
25-27. 


JOB'S    TRIUMPH. 


TOB'S  triumphant  assertion  of  his  unshaken 
confidence  in  God,  which  he  reaches 
near  the  close  of  the  nineteenth  chapter,  is 
deservedly  ranked  as  the  most  important 
passage  in  all  his  discourses.  In  some  re- 
spects it  is  one  of  the  most  signal  passages 
in  the  entire  Old  Testament,  not  so  much  in 
the  positive  amount  of  revelation  which  it 
contains  as  in  the  intrepid  spirit  of  an  uncon- 
querable piety  which  it  discloses.  It  exalts 
the  patriarch  of  Uz  to  a  level  with  the 
patriarch  of  Ur,  the  acknowledged  father  of 
the  faithful,  and  marks  Job  as  no  less  con- 
spicuously an  example  and  a  pattern  of  faith 
than  Abraham,  —  the  one  as  distinguished 
and  heroic  in  his  constancy  in  suffering  as 
the  other  in  his  unswerving  obedience. 


1 82  job's  triumph. 

The  centra]  position  of  this  noble  utter- 
ance in  the  discourses  of  Job  has  been  before 
referred  to  ;  and  that  it  is  the  turning-point 
in  his  discussions  with  his  friends,  the  cul- 
mination and  the  close  of  his  sore  inward 
conflict,  the  full  and  complete  outcoming  of 
a  trust  which  has  been  gradually  gathering 
strength  in  the  face  of  the  most  formidable 
opposition,  and  struggling  to  find  expression, 
and  the  crowning  victory  over  Satan's  fiercest 
and  most  subtle  temptation.  It  is  faith 
planting  itself  firmly  on  the  unseen,  when, 
not  one  single  external  ground  of  support 
remains.  The  flukes  of  his  anchor  have 
taken  hold  of  the  immovable  Rock  of  Ages, 
and  the  rage  of  the  tempest  and  the  dashing 
waves  and  the  heaving  sea  cannot  tear  his 
vessel  from  its  moorings.  Held  by  the  strong 
grasp  of  the  invisible,  which  is  no  less  real, 
solid,  and  abiding  because  it  is  out  of  sight, 
he  can  safely  defy  all  that  is  visible  and  on 
the  surface,  the  mutable  and  the  transient; 
and  Satan's  most  furious  assaults  have  no 
power  to  dislodge  him  or  unsettle  his  sure 
and  well-grounded  persuasion. 


job's  triumph.  183 

The  suffering  patriarch  is,  to  all  human 
appearance,  and  in  his  own  estimation,  sink- 
ing rapidly  to  the  grave  under  an  accumu- 
lation of  disasters,  which  seem  to  exhaust 
Satan's  fiendish  ingenuity  of  torture,  and 
which  appear  to  betoken  the  divine  displeas- 
ure. His  friends  charge  upon  him  that  God 
is  herein  bearing  testimony  against  his  ag- 
gravated criminality.  Conscious  of  his  integ- 
rity, and  yet  confounded  by  these  apparent 
evidences  of  God's  hostility  to  him,  he  pite- 
ously  pleads  with  God  no  longer  to  treat 
him  as  a  criminal,  since  he  does  not  deserve 
to  be  so  treated,  but  to  remove  His  heavy 
hand  and  openly  bear  witness  to  his  inno- 
cence and  uprightness.  But  his  cries  are 
unanswered.  He  cannot  get  his  case  before 
the  supreme  Judge  of  all  so  as  to  obtain 
the  hearing  and  the  adjudication  to  which 
he  makes  his  ineffectual  appeal.  The  Most 
High  does  not  in  any  way  interfere  to  take 
his  part,  or  to  redress  the  wrongs  which  His 
servant  is  enduring,  or  to  correct  the  grievous 
and   unjust    imputations  which    offer   them- 


184  job's  triumph. 

selves  as  so  direct  an  inference  from  God's 
own  dealings  with  him.  The  heavens  are 
silent.  The  situation  remains  unchanged. 
The  sufferings  of  Job  are  unabated.  His 
friends  continue  to  taunt  him  with  this  plain 
evidence  of  guilt. 

We  have  observed  the  growing  intensity 
of  Job's  inward  struggle,  and  the  strife  is  not 
yet  allayed.  He  repels  the  insinuations  of 
his  friends.  He  rejects  their  conclusion,  for 
it  is  contradicted  by  his  own  consciousness  ; 
but  he  cannot  break  the  logic  of  their  argu- 
ment. As  a  consequence  he  is  tossed  by 
conflicting  emotions.  He  seems  to  be  shut 
up  to  the  conclusion  that  God  is  unrighteously 
oppressing  him,  afflicting  him  without  cause 
or  punishing  him  for  crimes  which  he  has 
not  committed.  And  if  God  be  unrighteous, 
He  is  not  a  God  to  be  worshipped  and  con- 
fided in.  If  he  admit  this,  he  has  fallen 
before  the  temptation,  and  Satan  has  gained 
his  end.  But  how  can  he  escape  it  ?  The 
facts  stare  him  sternly  in  the  face.  And 
even  if  he  were  disposed  to  shut  his  eyes   to 


job's  triumph.  185 

them,  his  friends  with  officious  pertinacity 
are  for  ever  obtruding  them  upon  him  with 
their  inevitable  deductions. 

It  is  a  time  of  outspoken  frankness,  in 
which  the  convictions  of  his  soul  utter  them- 
selves without  reserve  and  without  disguise. 
He  cannot  shelter  himself  behind  conven- 
tional phrases  which  may  have  a  religious 
sound,  though  emptied  of  their  meaning  and 
not  expressive  of  his  real  and  honest  faith. 
He  is  not  in  a  mood  to  save  appearances  by 
the  gloss  of  pious  professions.  He  dare  not 
deceive  himself  and  others  even  by  uncandidly 
smoothing  over  difficulties  in  the  divine  ad- 
ministration, and  persuading  himself  that  he 
has  explained  what  he  has  simply  evaded. 
His  whole  soul  is  opened  before  us  down  to 
its  inmost  depths,  and  his  most  secret  imagin- 
ings. He  is  engaged  in  a  contest  for  life  or 
death,  in  which  every  thing  is  involved,  and 
no  mere  pretence  or  flimsy  material  can  avail 
him.  He  must  have  truth,  the  solid  basis 
of  truth  on  which  he  can  rest  with  un- 
shaken  conviction.      He   cannot  save  even 


1 86  job's  triumph. 

piety   by   shallow   pretext   or   insincere  pro- 
fession. 

In  the  unshrinking  truthfulness  with 
which  he  utters  his  inmost  feelings,  we  are 
startled  sometimes  by  the  boldness  and  seem- 
ing:  irreverence  with  which  he  arraio-ns  the 
rectitude  of  the  divine  proceedings.  But 
it  is  not  the  daring  recklessness  of  presump- 
tuous speculation  intruding  on  the  unre- 
vealed ;  nor  is  it  the  profane  utterance  of 
the  impious  transgressor  blaspheming  his 
Maker.  It  is  the  transparent  sincerity  of 
the  tempted  soul,  driven  almost  to  distrac- 
tion by  suggestions  which  are  forced  upon 
him,  and  which  he  cannot  shut  out.  They 
are  not  cherished  thoughts  on  which  he 
loves  to  dwell,  and  to  which  he  gladly  re- 
verts. They  are  like  frightful  spectral  illu- 
sions from  which  he  shrinks  away,  but  which 
continue  nevertheless  to  glare  upon  him 
until  by  the  surpassing  energy  of  faith  the 
dreadful  spell  is  broken,  and  the  temptation 
^,  vanquished. 

In  his  former  speeches  Job  has  been  strug- 


job's  triumph.  187 

gling  desperately  with   the   idea  perpetually 
thrust  upon   him  by  his  friends,  and  forcing 
itself  upon  him  from  all  that  he  endured,  that 
God  was  his   enemy.     Germs   of  hope  have 
arisen   within   him,  but  they  have   not  been 
sufficient   to   lift    the    burden    off   his    heart.* 
In  the  beginning  of  this  speech  he  is  still 
oppressed  by  these  evident  tokens  of  God's 
antagonism.       But    the    argument    of    guilt 
deduced   from   it  by  his  friends    he  warmly 
repels.     It  is  not  true,  as  they  urge,  that  he 
deserves  what  he  suffers.     It  is  not  true  that 
this  is   a  display  of  divine  justice :  no,  it  is 
injustice.     "  If  indeed," he  says  (xix.  5,  6),  "ye 
will  magnify  yourselves  against  me,  and  plead 
against  me  my  reproach  :  know  now  that  God 
hath  overthrown  me  ;  "  literally,  has  perverted, 
distorted,  wronged  me.     It  is  the  very  word 
that    Bildad   had  used  in  a    former  address, 
in  his  pious  indignation  at  the  sentiments   of 
Job,  viii.   3 :   "  Doth   God  pervert  judgment ; 
or  doth  the  Almighty  pervert  justice  ?  "    And 
it  is  the  same  that  Elihu  uses  subsequently 
in   his   rebuke   of    Job's   rash   and   impatient 


1 88  job's  triumph. 

utterances,  xxxiv.  12:"  Yea,  surely  God  will 
not  do  wickedly,  neither  will  the  Almighty 
pervert  judgment." 

But  such  perversion  Job  boldly  affirms 
to  exist  in  his  own  case.  In  his  conscious 
integrity  he  denies  the  righteousness  of  any 
infliction  which  charges  that  upon  him  of 
which  he  is  not  guilty ;  he  denies  the  justice 
of  executing  sentence  upon  him  for  crimes  of 
which  he  was  free.  If  God,  in  sending  these 
sufferings  upon  him,  has  marked  him  out  as 
a  criminal,  as  his  friends  allege,  then  He  has 
perverted  justice,  He  has  done  him  wrong. 
"  Behold,"  he  adds,  "  I  cry  out  of  wrong,  but 
I  am  not  heard :  I  cry  aloud,  but  there  is  no 
judgment."  He  is  the  innocent  victim  of 
most  cruel  treatment.  He  is  the  defence- 
less subject  of  ruffianly  violence,  who  screams 
for  help  against  pitiless  and  inhuman  out- 
rage, who  calls  for  justice  against  the  most 
grievous  oppression  and  wrong.  But  his 
cries  are  .  uttered  in  vain.  No  help  is 
afforded  him,  and  there  is  no  relaxation  of 
the    extreme    of    injury    inflicted.     And     he 


job's  triumph.  189 

proceeds  with  his  harrowing  recital  of  these 
causeless  and  gratuitous  inflictions  :  "  He 
hath  fenced  up  my  way  that  I  cannot  pass, 
and  He  hath  set  darkness  in  my  paths.  He 
hath  stripped  me  of  my  glory,  and  taken  the 
crown  from  my  head.  He  hath  destroyed 
me  on  every  side,  and  I  am  gone :  and  mine 
hope  hath  He  removed  like  a  tree.  He  hath 
also  kindled  His  wrath  against  me,  and  He 
counteth  me  unto  Him  as  one  of  His  enemies. 
His  troops  come  together,  and  raise  up  their 
way  against  me,  and  encamp  round  about 
my  tabernacle."  My  brethren,  acquaintance, 
kinsfolk,  familiar  friends,  my  servants,  maids, 
my  very  wife,  —  all  whom  I  loved  are  turned 
against  me.  "  My  bone  cleaveth  to  my  skin 
and  to  my  flesh,  and  I  am  escaped  with  the 
skin  of  my  teeth.  Have  pity  upon  me,"  he 
imploringly  adds,  "  have  pity  upon  me,  O 
ye  my  friends ;  for  the  hand  of  God  hath 
touched  me.  Why  do  ye  persecute  me  as 
God,  and  are  not  satisfied  with  my  flesh  ? " 
Why  will  you  too  join  in  this  relentless  per- 
secution which  God  has  initiated  against  me, 


190  JOBS    TRIUMPH. 

and  which  can  only  be  compared  to  raven- 
ous and  savage  beasts  of  prey  tearing  and 
gnawing  my  flesh  with  insatiate  greediness  ? 

Against  such  cruelty  and  injustice  on  the 
part  both  of  God  and  man  he  enters  his  ear- 
nest protest,  and  he  would  have  his  words  put 
on  permanent  record.  Outcast  alike  from 
God  and  man,  he  makes  his  appeal  to  the 
rocks.  Let  the  enduring  rock  be  his  monu- 
mental witness.  Let  there  be  carved  there, 
in  letters  that  shall  not  fade,  the  inscription 
of  his  innocence.  Though  God  and  man 
combine  to  condemn  him,  let  his  own  assev- 
erations of  his  integrity  be  graven  with  an 
iron  pen,  and  be  filled  in  with  lead  in  the 
rock  forever.  And  thus  may  the  everlasting 
rocks,  in  legible  inscriptions  never  to  be 
effaced,  bear  testimony  on  his  behalf;  and 
may  the  justice  that  he  vainly  craves  else- 
where find  at  least  its  indelible  and  faith- 
ful record  there. 

It  is  customary  to  understand  Job  here  as 
saying  that  he  would  have  the  words  which 
immediately  follow  graven  in  the  rock.      He 


JOBS    TRIUMPH.  191 

would  have  that  golden  sentence,  "  I  know 
that  my  Redeemer  liveth,  etc.,"  stand  on  per- 
petual record,  his  legacy  to  future  ages,  his 
testimony  through  all  time  that,  forsaken  as 
he  seemed  to  be  by  God  and  man,  he  never 
gave  up  his  confident  trust  in  God  his 
Saviour.  In  his  last  and  darkest  hours  he 
still  held  fast  his  unwavering  assurance  that 
God  was  his  Redeemer  and  Friend,  and 
though  his  body  perished  and  crumbled  into 
dust,  he  would  still  with  his  own  eyes  see 
God  who  would  appear  on  his  behalf.  And 
if  any  prefer  so  to  interpret  the  patriarch's 
wish,  we  make  no  serious  objection.  These 
words  are  certainly  worthy  of  being  recorded 
on  the  solid  rock.  No  grander  monumental 
inscription  can  be  found.  Job  could  not 
have  a  worthier  epitaph  upon  his  rock-hewn 
tomb.  In  no  way  could  a  more  exalted 
testimony  be  rendered  to  his  steadfast  piety 
than  by  preserving  this  outburst  of  trium- 
phant faith,  uttered  under  such  circumstances. 
These  words  stand  out  conspicuously  upon 
the  speeches  of  Job,  as  the  noblest,  the  loftiest, 

9 


192  job's  triumph. 

the  most  characteristic  that  he  ever  uttered, 
and  the  most  aptly  significant  of  the  power  of 
his  faith,  and  the  reaUty  of  his  pious  trust  in 
God.  So  that,  as  has  been  said  before,  if 
any  prefer  to  regard  these  as  the  words  which 
Job  would  have  to  be  carved  upon  the  rock, 
we  make  no  serious  objection. 

Yet  it  seems  to  us  that  those  interpreters 
have  more  accurately  divined  Job's  own  mean- 
ing, who  think  that  he  would  have  in  lasting 
record  on  the  rock  not  the  particular  state- 
ment about  to  be  made,  but  the  asseverations 
and  protestations  of  his  innocence  to  which 
he  had  given  utterance  over  and  over  again 
in  this  and  former  speeches.  So  that  this 
desire  to  have  his  words  inscribed  upon  the 
rock  is  not  so  much  an  introduction  to  what 
follows,  anticipating  and  preparing  for  the 
exultant  announcement  he  is  about  to  make, 
as  rather  the  conclusion  of  what  precedes. 
It  represents  not  his  rising  consciousness  of 
triumph,  but  rather  his  lowest  depth  of  deso- 
lation and  hopeless  despair,  joined  with  his 
inward   consciousne3S   of   integrity  that   de- 


JOBS    TRIUMPH.  193 

mands  some  recognition.  Bereft  of  every 
helper,  human  and  divine,  crushed  beneath 
an  unrighteous  sentence,  his  appeals  to  God 
unheard,  and  his  friends  joining  in  the  merci- 
less persecution,  he  asks  that  the  rocks  may- 
take  up  his  dying  declaration,  and  that  his 
words  may  be  indelibly  written  there,  so  that 
the  imperishable  stone  may  speak  his  inno- 
cence of  these  false  charges,  and  testify  of  the 
wrong  that  has  been  done  him,  after  his  own 
voice  is  hushed.  And  thus  his  appeal  to  the 
rocks  to  transmit  his  defence  to  all  coming 
time  will  be  parallel  to  his  passionate  apos- 
trophe to  the  earth  in  his  last  preceding 
speech,  xvi.  18 :  "  O  earth,  cover  not  thou  my 
blood,  and  let  my  cry  have  no  place."  It  is 
the  outcry  of  one  hopelessly  overwhelmed  by 
unjust  imputations  and  wrongful  treatment, 
but  to  whom  his  integrity  is  dearer  than  his 
life,  and  who  insists  that  w^hat  is  true  and 
right  shall  have  the  assertion  to  which  it  is 
entitled  ;  and  who  cannot  but  believe  after  all 
that  eternal  justice  shall  find  a  response  some- 
where and  at  some  time.  What  is  right  and 
just  must  be. 


194  JOBS    TRIUMPH. 

This  view  of  these  words  is  confirmed 
by  the  form  of  Job's  triumphant  declaration 
which  follows.  This  is  not  a  separate,  dis- 
connected sentence,  as  though  it  were  framed 
to  be  inscribed  by  itself  upon  the  rock  ;  but  it 
is  intimately  linked  with  what  precedes,  as 
though  it  had  been  intended  not  to  stand 
alone,  but  to  form  part  of  a  continuous  con- 
text, beginning  as  it  does  with  a  conjunction, 
"  For  I  know,"  or,  more  exactly  rendered,  "  And 
I  know  that  my  Redeemer  liveth."  A  mon- 
umental inscription  could  not  begin  with 
"  and."  This  necessarily  marks  a  connection 
with  some  thought  either  expressed  or  im- 
plied in  what  precedes.  And  this  connection 
or  continuation,  while  it  would  be  wholly 
wanting  in  an  isolated  legend  on  the  rocks,  is 
readily  traceable  upon  the  explanation  adopted 
above. 

Perishing  under  groundless  accusations  of 
whose  falsity  he  is  profoundly  conscious,  but 
which  he  has  no  means  of  adequately  refut- 
ing ;  God  apparently  testifying  against  him 
by  the  sufferings  which  He  sends  ;  his  friends 


JOBS    TRIUMPH.  195 

open-mouthed  and  loud  in  their  reproaches 
and  censures  ;  deserted  by  all,  and  despair- 
ing of  relief  from  any  quarter,  he  utters  as  his 
last  wish,  while  the  grave  is  opening  before 
him,  that  this  amount  of  justice  may  be  done 
him,  to  place  his  asseveration  of  innocence 
on  record  in  the  rock.  And  as  he  utters  the 
wish,  the  certainty  that  justice  must  and  will 
be  done  flashes  with  strong  conviction  on  his 
soul.  I  have  asked  a  record  on  the  rock ; 
and  all  the  while  I  know  that  my  Redeemer 
liveth.  I  need  no  monument  of  stone  to 
vindicate  me,  no  inscription  graven  with  an 
iron  pen  and  filled  in  with  letters  of  molten 
lead.  I  have  an  ever-living  and  almighty 
Redeemer,  who  will  rescue  me  from  wrong, 
and  defend  me  against  calumny,  and  who  will 
certainly,  and  in  spite  of  all  present  appear- 
ances, reveal  Himself  to  me  as  my  Friend, 
and  to  whom,  therefore,  with  implicit  confi- 
dence, I  intrust  my  cause. 

Who  the  Redeemer  is,  in  whom  Job  thus 
affirms  his  confidence,  cannot  admit  of  a 
moment's  doubt.     It  is  the  same  of  whom  he 


\\ 


196  job's  triumph. 

had  declared  in  his  preceding  speech,  xvi.  19, 
"  My  witness  is  in  heaven,  and  my  record  is  on 
high ;  "  and  whom  he  had  suppHcated  to  be 
his  surety  (xvii.  3)  when  all  others  refused  to 
espouse  his  cause ;  and  of  whose  sentence  in 
his  favor  he  had  again  and  again  expressed 
his  strong  assurance,  if  his  cause  could  but 
be  brought  before  Him  so  as  to  obtain  His 
decision.  Now  all  doubts  have  vanished : 
every  condition  that  had  previously  clogged 
his  hopes  is  removed.  The  Lord  has  under- 
taken for  him.  The  Lord  has  engaged  upon 
his  side.  The  Lord  will  defend  him  against 
all  injury  and  wrong.  God,  who  seems  to  be 
persecuting  him  with  such  relentless  hostility, 
is  not  his  Enemy ;  He  is  his  Redeemer. 

It  is  commonly  supposed,  and  with  reason, 
that  in  this  word  "  redeemer "  there  lies  an 
allusion  to  an  institution  dating  from  the 
simple  and  as  yet  but  partially  regulated 
society  of  patriarchal  times,  and  which  was 
subsequently  admitted  with  some  restrictions 
and  modifications  into  the  Mosaic  code.  It 
was  the   ofhce  of  the  next  of  kin  to  espouse 


JOBS    TRIUMPH.  197 

the  cause  of  his  injured  or  impoverished 
relative ;  to  redeem  his  property,  and  restore 
it  to  him  if  he  had  in  any  way  forfeited  it  or 
been  obHged  to  sell  it ;  to  defend  him  against 
injury  and  wrong ;  and,  especially,  to  avenge 
his  blood  if  he  had  been  unrighteously  slain. 
Now  God  has  assumed  the  part  of  the  next 
kinsman  in  relation  to  Job.  He  shall  redress 
his  wrongs;  He  shall  avenge  his  injuries; 
He  shall  deliver  him  out  of  the  bondage  of 
his  sorrows,  —  the  very  figure  which  is  em- 
ployed in  a  subsequent  part  of  this  book, 
where  the  Lord  is  said  to  have  "  turned  the 
captivity  of  Job."  The  frequency  with  which 
the  title  of  Redeemer  is  applied  to  God  in 
the  Old  Testament  makes  still  plainer  its 
application  here.  Jacob  speaks  of  the  divine 
angel  that  redeemed  him  from  all  evil  (Gen. 
xlviii.  16).  Moses  sings  (Ex.  xv.  13),  Thou 
hast  led  forth  the  people  which  Thou  hast 
redeemed.  David  invokes  (Ps.  xix.  14)  the 
Lord,  his  strength  and  his  redeemer.  With 
Isaiah  it  is  a  favorite  name :  The  Redeemer, 
the  Lord  of  hosts,  who  is  first  and  who  is 
last.    (Isa.  xliv.  6).  ' 


198  job's  triumph. 

When  Job  expresses  his  assurance  that  his 
Redeemer  lives,  he  means  not  merely  that 
He  now  exists,  as  opposed  to  the  idea  that 
there  is  no  one  now  existing  who  can  appre- 
ciate his  case  and  understand  his  real  charac- 
ter, and  who  is  willing  to  avow  Himself  his 
friend,  and  that  it  is  not  until  some  future 
generation  in  a  distant  age  shall  read  with 
unprejudiced  eye  his  words  sculptured  in  the 
rock  that  he  can  have  an  advocate  or  friend. 
Nor  is  it  simply  meant  that  He  possesses  a 
conscious  existence  in  contrast  with  the  life- 
less, insensate  rock ;  so  that  Job  is  not 
limited  to  the  mute  testimony  carved  upon 
the  motionless,  unconscious  stone.  He  has 
a  living  witness  and  defender.  Nor  is  it 
simply  existence  in  its  highest  style  that  is 
here  aflfirmed,  as  though  he  claimed  that  his 
Redeemer  was  the  ever-living  one,  to  whom 
life  is  essential  and  inherent,  the  self-existent 
and  eternal.  But  life  involves  active  agency 
in  the  character  maintained,  or  in  the  sphere 
to  which  it  belongs  ;  as  when  the  Lord  is 
styled  the  living  God   in  contrast  with  dead 


job's  triumph.  199 

and  lifeless  idols,  who  are  of  no  service  to 
their  worshippers,  "who  cannot  do  good, 
neither  can  they  do  evil."  The  living  God  is 
a  God  who  has  power  to  save  and  to  destroy, 
and  who  exerts  His  power  as  the  occasion 
demands.  A  living  Redeemer  is  one  who  is 
more  than  a  nullity  or  a  name  :  He  is  one 
who  will  act  as  such,  and  act  with  real,  sub- 
stantial effect. 

The  rest  of  Job's  triumphant  testimony,  as 
it  appears  in  the  authorized  English  transla- 
tion, would  lead  us  to  suppose  that  Job  ex- 
pected his  vindication  to  be  postponed  until 
the  end  of  the  world  and  the  general  resurrec- 
tion. It  -runs  thus :  "  For  I  know  that  my 
Redeemer  liveth,  and  that  He  shall  stand  at 
the  latter  day  upon  the  earth,  and  though 
after  my  skin  zvorms  destroy  this  body,  yet  in 
my  flesh  shall  I  see  God." 

Our  translators  have  here  followed  older 
versions ;  and,  without  designing  to  warp  the 
meaning  of  Job  or  to  change  the  purport  of  his 
words,  they  have  been  unconsciously  guided 
in  the  sense  which  they  have  assigned  to  his 

9* 


200  JOBS    TRIUMPH. 

expressions  by  their  knowledge  of  doctrines 
subsequently  revealed  with  a  clearness  greater 
than  that  with  which  they  had  been  made 
known  in  the  time  of  Job,  or  with  which 
they  are  here  presented  to  his  own  mind. 

Job  is  speaking  under  strong  excitement, 
and  in  the  language  of  lofty  poetry.  He 
uses  no  superfluous  words.  He  simply 
indicates  his  meaning  in  the  most  concise 
manner,  without  rounding  out  his  periods  or 
using  those  connectives  and  significant  par- 
ticles, which  would  be  demanded  in  perspicu- 
ous prose.  Hence  his  sentences  are  abrupt  and 
elliptical,  and  exactness  of  translation  is  diffi- 
cult. The  embarrassment  of  the  English 
translators  is  shown  by  the  unusual  number 
of  italic  words,  and  these  of  no  small  impor- 
tance to  the  meaning,  which  are  heaped 
tocrether  in  these  verses.  There  are  a  few 
grammatical  questions  in  the  original  passage 
which  it  is  difficult  to  settle  with  absolute 
certainty,  but  which,  however  determined,  do 
not  materially  affect  the  general  sense.  With- 
out laying  any  stress  upon  these,  therefore, 


JOBS    TRIUMPH.  20I 

we  propose  the  following  rendering  as  suf- 
ficiently accurate  for  our  present  purpose : 
"  And  I  know  my  Redeemer  liveth,  and 
last  on  earth  shall  He  arise ;  and  after  my 
skin,  which  has  been  destroyed  thus,  and  out 
of  my  flesh  shall  I  see  God." 

He  says  not  that  his  Redeemer  shall  stand 
upon  the  earth  or  make  His  appearance  upon 
it,  but  that  He  shall  arise,  address  Himself  to 
action.  He  shall  no  longer  sit  still,  as  though 
He  were  not  concerned  or  were  disposed  to 
take  no  part  in  what  was  transacting.  He 
shall  arise  and  participate  actively  in  the  mat- 
ter. As  when  the  suffering  Psalmists  so 
often  call  upon  God  to  arise :  (iii.  7)  "  Arise, 
O  Lord;  save  me,  O  my  God."  (ix.  19) 
"  Arise,  O  Lord  ;  let  not  man  prevail."  (xliv. 
26)  "  Arise  for  our  help,  and  redeem  us  for 
Thy  mercies'  sake." 

My  Redeemer  shall  arise  last ;  which  may 
mean  simply.  He  shall  arise  at  last  or  here- 
after. Or  the  strict  force  of  the  words  may 
be  retained.  Job  and  his  friends  had  been 
contending  first.      He   shall  arise  last,  enter 


202  JOBS    TRIUMPH. 

latest  on  the  scene,  with  the  Implication  that 
He  shall  take  the  matter  entirely  into  His 
own  hands,  and  settle  it  unresisted  in  His 
own  way.  And  still  further,  for  this  too  lies 
in  the  proper  meaning  of  the  word,  this 
shall  be  the  final  settlement  of  this  much  dis- 
puted case.  He  is  the  last,  and  none  shall 
come  after  Him  to  derange  or  alter  what  He 
has  done.  It  is  a  word  that  looks  to  all 
futurity,  and  stretches  to  the  utmost  limit  of 
time  that  the  subject  spoken  of  admits,  reach- 
ing out  to  a  boundless  eternity  even ;  for  it  is 
the  term  applied  to  the  unending  duration  of 
God  Himself,  who  is  the  first  and  who  is  the 
last. 

He  shall  arise  last  on  earth,  here  spoken  of 
as  the  scene  of  the  conflict  and  the  trials  which 
He  is  to  terminate  and  rectify.  Or,  as  the 
words  may  mean,  and  some  able  interpreters 
with  a  meas'ure  of  plausibility  understand 
them  to  mean,  "  over  the  dust ;  "  the  dust, 
that  is,  into  which  my  body  has  meanwhile 
mouldered  away.  Upon  which  rendering 
there  would   here  be  a  distinct  assertion  of 


JOB  S    TRIUMPH.  203 

what  was  already,  perhaps,  involved  in  the 
term  "  last,"  and  what  is  more  fully  brought 
out  in  the  words  that  follow,  that  this  inter- 
vention of  his  great  Redeemer  shall  occur 
after  he  is  dead.  It  will  not  take  place  until 
his  body  shall  have  been  committed  to  the 
grave,  and  mouldered  back  to  dust. 

But  whether  this  meaning  be  expressed  in 
this  particular  phrase  or  no,  it  is  made  dis- 
'  tinctly  prominent  in  what  follows.  "  And 
after  my  skin,  which  has  been  destroyed  thus, 
and  out  of  my  flesh  shall  I  see  God."  He 
looks  to  a  period  after  the  destruction,  the 
complete  disintegration  of  his  skin  ;  and  when 
he  himself,  the  living  part,  the  vital  spirit, 
shall  be  separated  from  his  flesh,  his  decay- 
ing and  lifeless  body.  The  just  sense  of 
these  expressions  compels  us  to  regard  Job 
as  contemplating  the  time  after  he  shall  be 
dead,  and  affirming  that  then  his  Redeemer 
God  shall  manifest  Himself  to  his  disem- 
bodied  spirit. 

Another  interpretation  which  has  been  put 
upon  this  verse,  and  upon  this  whole  passage, 


204  JOB  S    TRIUMPH. 

conceives  Job  to  be  here  looking  forward  not 
to  a  future  state,  but  to  the  restoration  of 
God's  favor,  and  his  own  dehverance  out 
of  all  his  troubles  in  the  present  life.  This 
is  not  wholly  a  modern  view,  nor  has  it  been 
confined  to  unbelieving  interpreters.  On  the 
contrary,  it  was  adopted  by  some  of  the  most 
eminent  of  the  Christian  Fathers ;  and  it  has 
been  ably  advocated  both  in  ancient  and  in 
recent  times.  The  decisive  objections  to  it 
are :  — 

1.  It  does  not  give  their  fair  meaning 
to  the  expressions  just  recited,  which  must 
denote  something  more  than  a  skin  daniaged, 
and  a  body  emaciated  by  disease.  It  is 
something  posterior  to  the  total  destruction 
and  dissolution  of  the  body  that  is  referred  to. 

2.  This  is  further  evident  from  the  con- 
stant tenor  of  Job's  language  elsewhere.  He 
regards  himself  as  on  the  verge  of  the  grave, 
which  is  already  claiming  him  as  its  own  (xvii. 
i).  Every  earthly  hope  is  annulled.  Every 
temporal  prospect  has  vanished.  He  in- 
variably repels  the  idea,  whenever  his  friends 


JOBS    TRIUMPH.  205 

present  it  to  him,  of  any  improvement  of  his 
condition  in  this  world  as  plainly  impossible, 
and  as  though  the  very  suggestion  of  it  were 
an  insult  to  his  understanding.  He  cannot, 
therefore,  himself  anticipate  what  he  uni- 
formly pronounces  irrational  and  absurd. 

3.  The  same  thing  appears  from  the 
general  drift  of  his  argument  with  his  friends, 
both  prior  to  this  passage  and  subsequent  to 
it.  His  friends  affirm  that  men  are  rewarded 
or  punished  in  this  life  according  to  their 
characters.  Job  steadfastly  denies  it.  If  he 
here  utters  his  expectation  that  God  will 
interfere  to  reward  his  piety  in  the  present 
life,  he  completely  abandons  his  own  position, 
and  adopts  theirs. 

4.  His  desire  to  have  his  protestation  of 
his  innocence  recorded  in  ineffaceable  char- 
acters upon  the  rock  becomes  ridiculous,  if 
he  cherished  the  assurance  that  the  strife  be- 
tween him  and  his  friends  would  be  settled 
in  his  favor  by  a  divine  intervention  in  his 
own  lifetime. 

5.  This  passage  forms  the  grand  climax  in 


2o6  job's  triumph. 

the  utterances  of  Job's  faith  and  pious  trust, 
to  which  he  has  from  the  first  been  slowly 
but  steadily  rising.  He  has  put  the  hypothe- 
sis before  of  a  life  beyond  the  grave,  though 
under  the  impossible  condition  of  a  return 
to  this  earthly  life  from  the  silence  and  the 
darkness  of  the  tomb,  when  God's  favor 
should  be  restored  to  him  once  more,  and 
He  should  again  have  a  desire  and  a  loving 
regard  for  the  work  of  His  own  hands.  In 
another  passage  he  had  uttered  his  outcry  of 
atrocious  murder,  and  appealed  to  the  earth 
not  to  cover  his  blood  unjustly  shed,  and  he 
had  found  the  witness  to  his  integrity  in 
heaven.  He  now  takes  one  step  in  advance, 
and  faith  reaches  its  clearest  and  fullest  ex- 
pression, and  confident  assurance  takes  the 
place  of  a  fitful,  trembling  hope.  The  hypo- 
thetical life  beyond  the  grave  becomes  a  real 
vision  of  God  by  his  disembodied  spirit.  The 
witness  to  his  integrity  on  high,  to  whom  he 
had  appealed  to  become  his  surety,  but  without 
any  positive  response,  becomes  his  Redeemer, 
the  avenger  of  his  innocent  blood,  vindicating 


JOBS    TRIUMPH.  207 

him,  appearing  as  his  champion,  and  on  his 
behalf,  and,  as  he  in  the  verses  next  ensuing 
warns  his  friends,  punishing  them  that  have 
done  him  wrong. 

6.  It  very  materially  lowers  the  evidence 
and  the  power  of  Job's  faith,  if  we  suppose 
him  to  be  referring  to  the  present  life.  The 
victory  which  he  here  gains,  and  which  as- 
sures his  triumph  over  Satan's  temptation,  — 
over  evei*y  possible  temptation,  in  fact,  —  is  the 
victory  of  faith  over  outward  sense.  If  any 
possible  hope  were  left  him  in  this  world,  the 
triumph  would  be  less  conspicuous  and  com- 
plete. It  is  only  when  we  see  him  shut  up 
absolutely  to  the  unseen,  and  perceive  that 
with  his  trust  in  God  he  ventures  boldly  into 
it,  not  groping  blindly  or  bewildered  as  in  the 
dark,  not  hesitating  as  in  uncertainty  or  per- 
plexity, not  shrinking  as  from  possible  danger 
or  mistake,  but  confident  as  if  treading  on 
solid  ground,  and  amid  positive  and  ascer- 
tained realities,  that  we  discern  the  true  heroism 
of  a  faith  like  that  of  Job,  and  its  unconquer- 
able energy.     In  his  own  esteem  he  is  sinking 


2o8  job's  triumph. 

into  the  grave  with  every  indication  surround- 
ing him  of  God's  relentless  hostility;  every 
possibility  of  a  return  of  God's  favor  to  him  in 
this  life  is,  to  his  mind,  utterly  shut  out;  and 
yet  so  fixed  is  he  in  his  inward  persuasion 
of  the  real  friendship  and  redeeming  grace  of 
God  to  him,  that  he  bursts  the  boundaries 
of  time,  passes  the  limits  of  the  visible  and  the 
tangible,  and  knows  that  the  manifest  tokens 
of  the  divine  love,  which  are  denied  him  here, 
will  be  granted  to  him  there.  What  can  shake 
the  trust  or  destroy  the  peace  of  that  man 
who  rests  his  certain  hope  on  the  immutable 
attributes  of  God  ?  Satan  and  the  world  may 
vent  their  rage  and  ply  their  arts  against  him 
in  vain.  He  is  proof  against  every  assault; 
for  his  steadfast  trust  is  founded  upon  the 
eternal  rock,  and  this  is  a  foundation  which 
never  can  be  shaken. 

It  is  no  real  objection  to  the  view  which 
has  been  taken  of  this  passage,  that  in  the 
subsequent  course  of  the  history  God  actually 
did  interfere  for  the  delivery  of  His  servant 
and  the  restoration  of   his  prosperity  in   the 


JOB  S    TRIUMPH.  209 

present  life.  What  was  in  the  secret  purpose 
and  plan  of  God  must  be  carefully  distinguished 
from  Job's  situation  as  it  appeared  to  his  own 
mind.  It  was  the  fact  of  his  beinor  left  so 
entirely  in  the  dark,  and  without  the  slightest 
clue  afforded  him  respecting  the  design  or 
issue  of  his  sufferings,  that  created  all  the 
mystery  of  the  dispensation,  and  laid  such  de- 
mands upon  his  faith,  and  established  such 
a  searching  test  of  the  reality  and  strength 
of  his  piety  and  adherence  to  God's  service. 
God  did  indeed  remove  Job's  sorrows,  and 
renewedly  grant  him  the  open  pledges  of  His 
favor  in  this  life.  He  thus  rewarded  His  ser- 
vant's faith,  contrary  to  and  beyond  all  expec- 
tation. Job  never  dreamed  of  such  a  result, 
as  all  his  speeches  show,  nor  once  conceived 
it  possible. 

Nor  is  there  any  force  in  the  objection  that 
Job  has  in  his  previous  speeches  uniformly 
spoken  of  death  as  the  end  of  every  activity 
and  hope,  and  has  never  let  fall  a  syllable 
from  which  it  could  be  inferred  that  he  be- 
lieved in  the  reality  and  certainty  of  a  future 


2IO  JOB  S    TRIUMPH. 

state.  The  conclusion  has  hence  been  drawn 
that  this  cannot  have  been  an  article  of  his 
faith,  and  that  he  could  not  therefore  have 
referred  to  it  in  the  passage  now  under  con- 
sideration. But  this  is  to  overlook  entirely 
the  progress  in  Job's  own  mind,  which  is 
delineated  in  such  a  vigorous  and  masterly 
manner  in  the  course  of  his  speeches.  We 
see  Job  in  the  beginning  involved  in  all  the 
mist  and  obscurity  which  overhung  the  fu- 
ture state  in  the  patriarchal  age,  when  no 
clear  and  unambiguous  revelations  had  been 
made  upon  this  subject.  The  continued  con- 
scious existence  of  the  soul  was  known,  but 
all  was  vague  and  shadowy  in  regard  to  that 
other  life.  Job  is,  by  the  intensity  of  the 
struggle  in  which  he  was  engaged,  driven 
step  by  step  into  clearer  views  of  this  sub- 
ject than  he  possessed  before.  We  can  watch 
his  gradual  advances  toward  it,  his  uncertain 
Teachings  out  after  it.  And  here  we  see  him 
grasping  it  with  all  the  fulness  of  assured  con- 
viction, as  the  only  way  out  of  inextricable 
darkness   and   despair,  the   inevitable    deduc- 


JOBS    TRIUMPH.  211 

tlon  of  a  most  indubitable  axiom,  the  only 
resting  place  of  his  unwavering  trust  in  the 
immutable  grace  of  God,  which  nothing  can 
wrest  from  him.     Of  God's  unchano-ino^  favor 

o      o 

he  is  inwardly  and  most  thoroughly  persuaded. 
There  is  no  room  remaining  for  that  favor  to 
display  itself  to  him  in  this  world.  And  the 
imperative  necessity  of  his  holiest  and  firmest 
convictions  compels  him  to  the  declaration, 
I  know  that  God  will  manifest  His  favor  to 
me,  though  it  be  after  my  body  has  decayed 
and  my  spirit  has  forsaken  this  tenement  of 
clay. 

Nor  is  there  any  greater  weight  in  the  ad- 
ditional objection  that  Job  makes  no  further 
use  of  this  great  truth  in  his  controversy  with 
his  friends.  He  never  refers  to  it  subse- 
quently, whether  to  console  himself  under 
the  rigors  of  his  own  hard  lot,  or  to  shed 
light  upon  the  enigmas  of  Providence  in  the 
unequal  distribution  of  good  and  evil,  or  to 
refute  the  constantly  repeated  tenet  of  his 
friends  of  a  retribution  in  the  present  life. 
A   doctrine   of   such  vast  importance    in    its 


2  12  JOBS    TRIUMPH. 

bearings  on  the  subject  under  discussion 
could  not,  it  is  alleged,  flash  up  in  one  single 
passage,  and  then  never  be  alluded  to  again. 
The  fact  that  it  is  not  brought  up  and  insisted 
upon  elsewhere,  is  held  to  warrant  the  infer- 
ence that  it  is  not  really  contained  here. 

But  this  is  to  mistake  entirely  the  part 
which  this  doctrine  plays  in  the  book  of  Job. 
It  is  not  offered  as  a  solution  of  the  enigmas 
of  divine  Providence.  It  is  not  even  pre- 
sented as  the  basis  of  consolation  for  the 
tempted  and  afiflicted.  The  comfort  of  the 
sorrowing  rests  on  a  deeper  ground  than 
this,  as  is  subsequently  unfolded  in  the 
speech  of  Elihu,  and  by  the  Lord  Himself, 
to  whom  it  is  reserved  to  present  in  its  true 
light  a  subject  which  has  only  been  growing 
more  and  more  perplexed  under  the  reason- 
ings and  discussions  of  Job  and  his  three 
^'friends.  The  doctrine  of  immortality  comes 
in  solely  to  still  Job's  inward  conflict,  and 
bring  him  to  a  settled  conviction  that  there 
is  peace  between  his  soul  and  God,  which  no 
outward  and  temporal  troubles  can   destroy.  '^ 


JOBS    TRIUMPH.  213 

This  it  effectually  does.  Job's  inward  agita- 
tion ceases  from  this  moment.  He  is  no 
longer  distracted  by  the  sense  of  God's  hos- 
tility and  wrath.  His  outward  situation  is 
unchanged,  and  the  problem  of  his  suffer- 
ings is  as  mysterious  as  ever;  but  he  has 
attained  to  inward  peace.  He  knows  that 
his  Redeemer  liveth,  and  that,  after  his  worn 
and  suffering  body  shall  be  resolved  into 
dust,  the  clouds  shall  break  away,  which  now 
obstruct  his  vision  of  the  face  of  God.  The 
lesson  of  immortality  has  accomplished  its 
end.  It  need  not,  therefore,  be  repeated. 
And  that  it  is  not  applied  to  matters  with 
which  in  the  plan  and  purpose  of  this  book 
it  has  nothing  to  do,  is  surely  no  argument 
against  its  appearance  here,  where  its  intro- 
duction was.  essential. 

But  in  what  relation,  it  may  be  further  asked, 
does  this  passage  stand  to  the  doctrine  of  the 
Messiah  and  of  a  corporeal  resurrection  ?  Is 
Job's  Redeemer  ours,  and  his  faith  the  same 
in  which  the  people  of  God  now  rejoice  in  the 
completed  victory  over  death  and  the  grave  ? 


214  JOBS    TRIUMPH. 

In  germ  and  substance  It  was,  but,  as  It  lay- 
before  his  consciousness,  not  in  the  same  de- 
veloped form.  God  was  his  Redeemer :  Christ, 
who  was  in  the  beginning  with  God  and  was 
God,  is  ours.  When  Job  appeals  to  his 
Redeemer,  he  does  so  without  even  remotely 
apprehending  that  He  is  the  second  person  of 
the  Godhead ;  for  of  the  distinction  of  persons 
in  the  divine  Being,  and  of  the  doctrine  of  the 
Trinity  as  unfolded  in  the  New  Testament, 
he  knew  nothing.  But  he  addresses  Him  in  a 
character,  and  solicits  the  fulfilment  of  an 
office  which  distinctively  belongs  to  God  the 
Son.  He  is,  and  has  been  in  every  age,  the 
Redeemer  out  of  every  distress,  the  Guardian 
and  Protector  of  His  people,  and  their  De- 
liverer both  from  temporal  distress  and  from 
that  everlasting  woe  of  which  the  former  is  the 
figure  and  the  type.  It  is  He  to  whom  the 
saints  of  God  are  indebted  for  that  joyful  pros- 
pect of  the  vision  of  God  beyond  the  grave,  to 
which  Job  looked  forward.  So  that  the  doc- 
trine of  Christ  is  here  approached  from  its 
divine  side,  not  as  the  Son  of  Abraham,  but  as 
the  Son  of  God. 


JOBS    TRIUMPH.  215 

And  then  perhaps  it  may  not  be  without  its 
deeper  significance  and  its  divinely  intended 
meaning  that  the  term  "  Redeemer  "  had  the 
association  Hnked  with  it,  both  in  patriarchal 
and  Mosaic  usage,  of  the  next  of  kin.  Is  there 
not  here  possibly  a  shadowing  forth  of  more 
than  Job  himself  intended  or  imagined  when 
he  used  the  word  ?  an  index  pointing  to  that 
divine  Redeemer,  who  is,  withal,  our  nearest 
Kinsman,  and  who  allied  Himself  to  us  in  the 
bonds  of  our  common  humanity,  bone  of  our 
bone,  and  flesh  of  our  flesh,  that  He  might 
have  a  kinsman's  right  to  espouse  our  cause, 
to  vindicate  us  from  the  accusations  of  the 
law,  and  free  us  from  the  sentence  of  death 
written  in  our  members,  and  open  to  us  life 
and  immortality  with  the  beatific  vision  of 
God  ?  So  that  as  Abraham  saw  Christ's  day, 
it  may  likewise  be  said  of  Job  that  he  rejoiced 
to  see  Christ's  day,  and  he  saw  it  and  was 
glad.  Only  it  was  the  seed  of  Abraham  to 
whom  the  father  of  the  faithful  looked  forward. 
It  was  his  divine  Redeemer  that  gladdened 
the  believinor  soul  of  the  man  of  Uz. 

o 

10 


2i6  job's  triumph. 

The  human  aspect  of  Christ's  work,  so  far 
as  it  is  foreshown  in  the  book  of  Job,  is  chiefly 
set  forth  by  Job  himself,  in  his  own  person,  as 
the  type  of  the  man  of  sorrows,  forsaken  and 
persecuted  by  his  friends,  and  abandoned 
apparently  by  God,  and  yet  for  whom  the 
cross  was  the  passage  way  to  the  crown,  and 
suffering  to  a  glorious  reward,  and  the  fruit 
of  the  travail  of  whose  soul  abounded  to  the 
blessing  of  others,  as  Job's  intercession  brought 
healing  to  his  three  friends,  and  he  has  been  a 
helper  to  the  distressed  from  his  ow^n  day  to 
this. 

The  resurrection  of  the  body  was  probably 
not  present  to  Job's  thoughts,  certainly  not  in 
the  form  of  a  general  and  simultaneous  rising 
from  the  dead.  And  yet  it  is  so  linked, 
seminally  at  least,  with  our  continued  spiritual 
existence,  and  it  is  so  natural  and  even  neces- 
sary for  us  to  transfer  our  ideas  of  being,  drawn 
from  the  present  state,  to  the  great  hereafter, 
that  it  may  perhaps  be  truly  said  that  the 
germs  of  the  doctrine  of  the  resurrection 
may   likewise   be  detected  here.     "  Whom   I 


JOBS    TRIUMPH.  217 

shall  see  for  myself,"  says  Job,  "  and  mine  eyes 
shall  behold,  and  not  another,"  —  so  natural  was 
it  to  transfer  the  thought  of  these  corporeal 
organs  along  with  this  personal  identity,  upon 
which  he  insists,  even  while  speaking  of  him- 
self as  disembodied.  We  shall  not  here  revive 
the  curious  and  profitless  speculations  to  which 
these  words  have  given  rise,  nor  shall  we 
involve  ourselves  in  any  discussion  as  to 
w^hether  Job  means  eyes  of  the  soul  or 
eyes  of  the  body.  It  is  enough  that  we  find 
here  suggested  the  intimacy  of  the  link  which 
binds  the  two  parts  of  our  nature  together, 
and  the  powerful  association  which  almost 
inevitably  carries  us  forward  from  the  con- 
tinued life  of  the  soul  to  the  restored  life  of 
the  body.  And  then,  when  we  add  to  this 
the  ambiguity  of  certain  expressions  here  em- 
ployed, and  which  may  not  have  been  wholly 
unintended  (shall  we  say  ? )  by  the  Spirit  of 
truth,  so  that  they  yield  themselves  readily 
to  the  setting  forth  of  the  doctrine  of  the  res- 
urrection, as  shown  in  our  own  English  trans- 
lation and  in  various  other  versions,  ancient 


2i8  job's  triumph. 

and  modern,  it  will  appear  that  this  passage 
has  not  been  without  important  bearings,  at 
least,  upon  the  history  of  the  belief  in  this 
great  and  cardinal  doctrine  of  the  gospel  of 
the  Son  of  God,  if  not  upon  its  actual  dis- 
closure in  the  course  of  divine  revelation. 


CHAPTER  VII. 


Hozv   tJien  comfort  ye  me  in  vain,  seeing  in  your 
answers  tJiere  remaineth  falseJioodf  —  Job  xxi.  34. 


JOB    REFUTES    HIS    FRIENDS. 


T 


HE  crisis  of  the  temptation  is  past,  but 
Job's  perplexity  is  not  yet  removed.  He 
refuses  to  be  driven  from  his  constant  trust  in 
God  by  all  the  influences  that  Satan  has  arrayed 
against  him.  Amidst  all  the  seeming  evidences 
of  God's  hostility,  he  maintains  his  confidence 
in  him  as  his  Redeemer.  He  who  is  afflicting 
him  now  will  effect  his  deliverance  hereafter. 
But  the  time  of  this  deliverance  has  not  yet 
come.  He  is  walking  in  darkness,  trusting  in 
the  Lord.  The  storm  of  calamity  continues 
without  abatement,  and  the  mystery  of  his  sor- 
rows is  still  unsolved. 

Hitherto  Job  has  spoken  principally  to  God. 
It  was  with  Him  that  he  had  to  do,  rather  than 
with  his  friends.  That  which  has  been  chiefly 
ao-itatino:  him,  and  which  was  in  fact  the  main- 
spring  of  the  temptation,  was  the  question  of 


2  22  JOB    REFUTES    HIS    FRIENDS. 

his  personal  relation  to  his  Maker.  When  his 
friends  affirmed  and  reiterated,  as  they  did  in 
every  speech  they  made,  the  doctrine  of  a  provi- 
dential retribution,  that  it  was  the  wicked  who 
suffered  under  God's  righteous  rule  and  in  pro- 
portion to  their  wickedness.  Job  made  immedi- 
ate application  of  this,  as  they  designed  that  he 
should,  to  his  own  case.  He  had,  indeed,  more 
than  once  declared  the  falsity  of  the  general 
principle  :  "  He  destroyeth  the  perfect  and  the 
wicked.  If  the  scourge  slay  suddenly.  He  will 
laugh  at  the  trial  of  the  innocent.  The  earth 
is  given  into  the  hand  of  the  wicked:  He  cover- 
eth  the  faces  of  the  judges  thereof"  (ix.  22-24). 
"  The  tabernacles  of  robbers  prosper,  and  they 
that  provoke  God  are  secure ;  into  whose  hand 
God  bringeth  abundantly  "  (xii.  6). 

But  this  was  only  incidental  to  the  main  cur- 
rent of  his  thoughts.  He  was  in  no  mood  for 
an  abstract  discussion.  The  personal  question 
involved  in  it  swallowed  up  every  other  consid- 
eration. It  concerned  what  was  dearer  to  him 
than  life.  It  affected  the  very  foundation  of 
his  trust  in  God.     It  was  not  simply  that  he  had 


JOB    REFUTES    HIS    FRIENDS.  223 

a  tender  regard  for  his  reputation,  and  that  he 
could  not  bear  to  have  a  cloud  brought  over  his 
good  name.  He  who  had  borne  the  loss  of 
property  and  children,  and  endured  the  suffer- 
ings inflicted  on  his  own  person  with  such  noble 
resignation,  could  also  have  submitted  with 
equanimity  to  unjust  censures  and  false  re- 
proaches. That  was  not,  dear  as  his  good  name 
was  to  him,  the  tenderest  and  most  vital  point. 
The  estimation  in  which  he  was  held  by  his 
fellow-men  was  not  his  chief  treasure.  But  his 
conscious  integrity  was  an  inalienable  posses- 
sion. This  he  could  not  part  with.  And  if 
the  affirmation  of  his  friends  was  true,  and  the 
rectitude  of  Him  who  ruled  the  world  seemed 
to  give  it  sanction,  then  God  w-as  punishing  him 
for  crimes  w^hich  he  was  conscious  that  he  had 
never  committed.  He  was,  indeed,  in  a  most 
pitiable  dilemma.  If  he  denied  the  position  of 
his  friends,  then  the  plain  inference  w^as  that 
God  was  unjust.  If  he  assented  to  it,  then  God 
was  unjust.  And,  in  either  case,  how  could  he 
serve  a  God  w^ho  was  unjust,  and  w^as  withal 
so  pitiless  and  so  cruel  ? 

10* 


\i 


224  JOB    REFUTES    HIS    FRIENDS. 

Satan  seemed,  at  length,  to  have  driven  him 
into  a  position  from  which  there  was  no  escape. 
How  can  he  do  otherwise  than  renounce  the 
service  of  God  ?  What  basis  remains  for  that 
confidence  and  reverential  homage  which  is 
essential  to  true  worship  ?  Satan  has  complete- 
ly enveloped  him  with  his  deadly  snare,  and  it 
would  appear  as  though  there  were  no  alterna- 
tive.    Job  must  fall  before  his  adversary. 

We  have  traced  the  fierce  and  weary  conflict 
to  its  final  issue.  We  have  watched  him  in  his 
inward  strife,  in  his  piteous  moans,  his  expostu- 
lations with  God,  his  vain  appeals  to  Him  to 
declare  Himself  on  his  side.  We  have  seen  him 
driven  to  and  fro  in  his  tumultuous  agitation, 
until,  forced  to  the  very  edge  of  the  precipice, 
and  apparently  about  to  fall  hopelessly  and 
helplessly  into  the  awful  chasm  that  yawned 
beneath  him,  he  cleared  it  by  one  energetic 
act  of  faith,  reaching  forth  into  the  unseen, 
and  sustaining  himself  without  any  visible 
support. 

The  personal  question  is  now  settled,  and  his 
intense  inward  agitation  has  subsided.     He  is 


JOB    REFUTES    HIS    FRIENDS.  225 

in  a  much  calmer  and  more  tranquil  state  of 
mind.  He  has  gained  that  unshaken  conviction 
of  the  rectitude  and  goodness  of  God,  which 
enables  him  to  claim  Him  as  his  Redeemer  in 
spite  of  all  adverse  appearances.  This  source 
of  his  disquiet  is  put  to  rest.  The  power  of 
the  temptation  is  broken.  Satan  cannot  detach 
him  from  the  service  of  God,  seeing  that  he 
holds  fast  to  his  faith  in  Him,  in  spite  of  all  the 
suggestions  of  sense  and  of  reason. 

Job  is  safe  from  falling.  But  outward  sense 
and  human  reason  still  present  a  problem,  w^hich 
baffles  him  completely.  He  holds  fast  to  his 
confidence  in  God,  but  he  is  bewildered  never- 
theless. The  solution  of  his  friends  is  no  so- 
lution. According  to  their  principles,  indeed, 
there  is  no  enigma  in  Providence.  They  see 
nothing:  but  the  evident  and  uniform  reio^n  of 
justice.  Job  shows,  on  the  contrary,  that  this 
is  not  the  case.  He  takes  issue  with  them  in 
regard  to  their  fundamental  principle,  and  ex- 
poses its  falsity.  It  is  not,  as  they  allege,  a  fact 
of  uniform  experience  that  the  righteous  are 
rewarded  and  the  wicked  suffer.     This  is  the 


J 


226  JOB    REFUTES    HIS    FRIENDS. 

point  to  which  he  addresses  himself   in   his 
remaining  speeches. 

It  is,  as  he  avers,  a  most  distressing  truth, 
one  that  fills  him  with  painful  emotions  at 
every  contemplation  of  it,  and  at  which  they 
might  well  stand  aghast  themselves.  The 
administration  of  this  world  is  not  conducted 
on  such  evident  principles  of  equity  as  they 
have  maintained.  "  Mark  me,  and  be  aston- 
ished, and  lay  your  hand  upon  your  mouth. 
Even  when  I  remember  I  am  afraid,  and  trem- 
bling taketh  hold  on  my  flesh"  (xxi.  5,  6).  So 
far  from  just  retribution  overtaking  the  guilty, 
*bad  men  are  often  signally  prospered.  "  Where- 
fore do  the  wicked  live,  become  old,  yea,  are 
mighty  in  power?  Their  seed  is  established 
in  their  sight  with  them,  and  their  offspring 
before  their  eyes.  Their  houses  are  safe  from 
fear,  neither  is  the  rod  of  God  upon  them. 
They  send  forth  their  little  ones  like  a  flock, 
and  their  children  dance.  They  take  the 
timbrel  and  harp,  and  rejoice  at  the  sound  of 
the  organ.  They  spend  their  days  in  wealth, 
and   in    a   moment   go   down   to   the  grave." 


JOB    REFUTES    HIS    FRIENDS.  2  2/ 

Their  merry,  joyous  prosperity  continues  to 
the  very  last.  Experiencing  no  reverses  and 
no  unusual  calamity,  with  no  check  upon 
their  good  fortune,  and  no  term  of  suffering 
that  could  be  regarded  as  a  penalty  for  their 
misdeeds,  they  go  down  peacefully  and  quietly 
to  the  grave.  Their  life  is  filled  up  with 
pleasure,  and  with  every  form  of  earthly  good 
to  its  very  close.  And  the  natural  consequence 
follows.  In  their  arrogant  and  impious  pre- 
sumption they  refuse  all  subjection  to  the 
Most  High.  "  Therefore  they  say  unto  God, 
Depart  from  us ;  for  we  desire  not  the  knowl- 
edge of  Thy  ways.  What  is  the  Almighty, 
that  we  should  serve  Him  ?  and  what  profit 
should  we  have,  if  we  pray  unto  Him  ?  " 
^  Bildad   had   said  (xviii.  5),    "  The  light  of 

the  wicked  shall  be  put  out;  "  and  verse  12, 
"  destruction  shall  be  ready  at  his  side."  Job, 
with  such  facts  of  experience  in  mind  as  he 
has  just  recited,  asks  in  reply.  How  often  is 
this  the  case  ?  It  is  by  no  means  the  in- 
variable rule.  "  How  oft  is  the  candle  of 
the  wicked    put   out?    and   how  oft   cometh 


^ 


2  28  JOB    REFUTES    HIS    FRIENDS. 

their  destruction  upon  them  ?  How  often  does 
God  distribute  sorrows  in  His  anger,  and 
make  them  as  stubble  before  the  wind,  and  as 
chaff  that  the  storm  carrieth  away  ?  " 

But,  interpose  the  friends,  the  retribution 
is  sure  to  come  :  it  is  only  awhile  delayed. 
*'  God  layeth  up  his  iniquity  for  his  chil- 
dren "  (v.  4,  xviii.  19,  XX.  10).  This,  Job 
retorts,  is  no  retribution  at  all  in  any  proper 
sense.  "  Let  Him  reward  him,"  the  sinner 
himself,  in  his  own  person,  "  that  he  may  know 
it.  Let  his  eyes  see  his  destruction,  and  let 
him  drink  of  the  wrath  of  the  Almighty. 
For  what  pleasure  hath  he  in  his  house  after 
him,  when  the  number  of  his  months  is  cut 
off  in  the  midst  ? "  How  is  he  affected  by 
what  happens  to  his  children,  after  he  is  dead 
and  gone  ?  They  were  presuming  to  "teach 
God  knowledge,"  by  thus  prescribing  a  law 
for  His  government  of  the  world,  and  might 
justly  fear  that  sentence  with  which  He  re- 
wards the  proud.  On  the  other  hand,  he 
alleges  that  in  actual  fact  there  was  no  dis- 
crimination exercised  in  the  fortunes  allotted 


JOB    REFUTES    HIS    FRIENDS.  229 

to  men.  No  reason  could  be  assigned  why 
some  men  never  have  trouble,  and  others 
never  have  any  thing  else.  "  Ye  say,  Where 
is  the  house  of  the  prince  ?  and  where  are 
the  dwelling-places  of  the  wicked  ? "  imply- 
ing that  they  have  disappeared,  or  that  their 
ruins  only  remain  as  monuments  of  God's 
righteous  vengeance.  But  this  is  not  so. 
"  Have  ye  not  asked  them  that  go  by  the 
way }  and  do  ye  not  know  their  tokens,  that 
the  wicked  is  spared  ^  in  the  day  of  destruc- 
tion ?  they  are  brought  off  in  the  day  of 
wrath."  They  are  often  screened  from  calam- 
ities that  befall  better  men.  And  when  they 
die,  instead  of  being  followed  by  execrations  or 
regarded  as  malefactors,  cut  o&  by  the  just 
sentence  of  Heaven,  they  are  buried  with 
every  mark  of  distinction,  attendant  crowds 
doing  honor  to  their  memory  and  perpetuat- 
ing their  pernicious  example. 

Astounded  by  this  audacious   attack  upon 
their  stronghold,  this  plump  denial   of  what 

*   The   common  rendering  here  reverses  Job's  meaning, 
and  destroys  his  argument. 


230  JOB    REFUTES    HIS    FRIENDS. 

they  have  all  along  been  asserting  as  an 
incontrovertible  axiom,  and  the  foundation 
of  their  whole  argument,  the  friends  are 
obliged  to  modify  materially  their  method 
of  attack.  Eliphaz,  who  speaks  next,  comes 
to  the  rescue  of  the  principle  by  a  furious 
onslaught  upon  Job  himself.  Their  oft- 
repeated  maxim  itself,  in  its  broad  univer- 
sality, cannot  again  be  affirmed  in  the  face 
of  what  has  just  been  said.  But  he  is  more 
than  ever  convinced  that  it  exposes  the  real 
secret  of  all  Job's  troubles.  Whether  it  can 
be  established  as  a  general  rule  or  not,  whether 
it  is  applicable  to  all  other  cases  or  not,  it  un- 
questionably holds  true  in  this  instance.  He 
therefore  restricts  himself  no  longer  to  covert 
insinuations  or  indirect  suggestions,  but  makes 
positive  and  explicit  charges  of  enormous 
wickedness,  and  assigns  this  as  the  undoubted 
reason  of  these  terrible  inflictions.  God 
could  have  no  motive  for  dealing  with  Job 
otherwise  than  with  impartial  justice.  He 
must  have  been  guilty,  therefore,  of  atro- 
cious crimes,  the  righteous  penalty  for  which 
he  is  now  enduring. 


JOB    REFUTES    HIS    FRIENDS.  23 1 

The  whole  matter  is  thus  brought  to  a  sim- 
ple issue.  Is  Job  a  gross  transgressor,  or  is 
he  not  ?  The  charge  is  open,  and  unambigu- 
ous. Job  promptly  takes  up  the  challenge, 
and  meets  the  charge  with  an  equally  explicit 
denial.  God  has  indeed  hidden  Himself  in 
the  mystery  of  these  inexplicable  sorrows, 
which  continue  to  press  upon  him  with  the 
same  dire  weight  as  before.  He  is  withdrawn 
beyond  the  reach  of  outward  sense.  But  con- 
cealed as  He  is  from  sight,  impossible  as  it  is 
to  penetrate  to  His  secret  seat  to  urge  his 
plea,  and  to  obtain  the  removal  of  these  dis- 
tresses under  which  he  now  groans.  Job  yet 
makes  to  Him  his  confident  appeal :  "  He 
knoweth  the  way  that  I  take  :  when  He  hath 
tried  me,  T  shall  come  forth  as  gold.  My 
foot  hath  held  His  steps.  His  way  have  I 
kept,  and  not  declined.  Neither  have  I  gone 
back  from  the  commandment  of  His  lips  ;  I 
have  esteemed  the  words  of  His  mouth  more 
than  my  necessary  food."  And,  as  he  pro- 
ceeds to  say,  the  world  is  full  of  just  such 
enigmas,  of  open  wickedness  that  is  suffered 


232  JOB    REFUTES    HIS    FRIENDS. 

to  go  unpunished,  and  of  grievous  wrongs 
that  are  not  redressed. 

As  the  charges  brought  against  Job  are 
wholly  destitute  of  proof,  being  mere  infer- 
ences from  a  principle,  which,  as  has  now 
been  shown,  is  not  verified  by  the  actual 
experience  of  the  world,  Bildad  cannot  again 
repeat  them  in  the  face  of  Job's  solemn  assev- 
eration of  his  innocence  and  his  appeal  to  the 
Searcher  of  hearts.  There  is  consequently 
nothing  for  him  to  do,  if  he  V\^oul(i  maintain 
the  show  of  an  argument,  but  to  fall  back  upon 
the  sinfulness  inherent  in  human  nature.  No 
man  can  be  pure  in  the  sight  of  the  infinite 
God.  This  point  had  been  made  by  Eliphaz 
at  the  very  outset  of  the  discussion,  and  it  had 
been  sufficiently  answered  long  since.  Bildad, 
sensible  of  the  weakness  of  his  position,  makes 
no  attempt  to  illustrate  or  enforce  it,  and,  after 
a  few  feebly  uttered  sentences,  relapses  into 
silence.  The  friends  withdraw  discomfited 
from  the  contest. 

Job  cannot  refrain  from  taunting  them  with 
the  completeness  of  their  failure  in  an  argu- 


JOB    REFUTES    HIS    FRIENDS.  233 

ment  which  they  have  been  conducting  with 
so  much  pretension.  He  then  seizes  the 
opportunity  to  guard  his  language  against 
misconception.  In  saying  what  he  had  done 
respecting  the  inequahties  of  divine  provi- 
dence, he  had  neither  meant  to  reflect  upon 
the  glorious  nature  of  God,  nor  to  deny  the 
existence  of  moral  retributions.  He  accord- 
ingly afhrms  the  exalted  majesty  of  God  in  as 
lofty  terms  as  his  friends  themselves  could  em- 
ploy. And,  while  continuing  to  insist  upon  his 
own  integrity,  notwithstanding  the  afflictions 
sent  upon  him,  he  freely  admits,  and  this  in 
language  as  emphatic  as  their  own,  the  reality 
of  God's  providential  government,  and  that 
punishment  does  overtake  the  ungodly.  Nev- 
ertheless there  is  a  mystery  enveloping  the  di- 
vine administration,  which  is  quite  impenetrable 
to  the  human  understanding. 

This  thought  of  the  impossibility  of  men's 
arriving,  by  their  own  unaided  powers,  at  any 
comprehension  of  the  divine  plan  in  the  admin- 
istration of  the  universe,  is  illustrated  with  great 
beauty.    An  apt  figure  is  taken  from  the  art  of 


2  34  JOB    REFUTES    HIS    FRIENDS. 

mining.  Men  can  discover  the  precious  and 
the  useful  metals,  though  they  are  hidden  deep 
under  ground.  They  will  descend  into  the 
bowels  of  the  earth,  and  push  their  shafts  re- 
mote from  the  habitation  of  men ;  and,  regard- 
less of  the  obstructions  that  block  their  way,  and 
of  the  gathering  streams  that  hinder  their  prog- 
ress, and  of  the  obscurity  which  reigns  in  these 
dark  abysses,  they  cut  a  passage  through  the 
rocks,  and  beneath  the  mountains,  to  the  treas- 
ures of  which  they  are  in  quest.  But  there  is  a 
treasure  greater  far,  which  cannot  be  thus  ob- 
tained ;  a  treasure  that  gold  nor  silver  cannot 
equal,  and  which  vastly  exceeds  in  worth  the 
most  valued  of  jewels  and  precious  stones.  This 
no  ingenuity  of  men,  and  no  search,  however 
prolonged  or  anxious,  can  ever  discover.  Where 
shall  wisdom  be  found  ?  and  where  is  the  place 
of  understanding  ?  It  is  hid  from  the  eyes  of  all 
living,  and  kept  close  from  the  fowls  of  the  air. 
Even  the  world  of  the  departed  does  not  possess 
it:  they  "have  heard  the  fame  thereof,"  but 
they  are  not  able  to  grasp  it.  There  is  but  one 
Being   in   the   universe  who   does   possess   a 


JOB    REFUTES    HIS    FRIENDS.  235 

perfect  comprehension  of  God's  grand  plan, 
and  that  is  He  who  adjusted  all  things  with  in- 
finite precision,  and  who  is  guiding  all  to  His 
own  preordained  results.  And  He  who  is 
infinite  in  knowledge  has  disclosed  to  man 
wherein  for  him  true  practical  wisdom  lies. 
"  God  understandeth  the  way  thereof,  and  he 
knoweth  the  place  thereof.  For  he  looketh  to 
the  ends  of  the  earth,  and  seeth  under  the 
whole  heaven ;  to  make  the  weight  for  the 
winds ;  and  he  weigheth  the  waters  by  measure. 
When  he  made  a  decree  for  the  rain,  and  a  way 
for  the  lightning  of  the  thunder ;  then  did  he 
see  it,  and  declare  it ;  he  prepared  it,  yea,  and 
searched  it  out.  And  unto  man  he  said.  Behold, 
the  fear  of  the  Lord,  that  is  wisdom ;  and  to 
depart  from  evil  is  understanding." 

The  providence  of  God  is  not  conducted 
upon  such  a  palpable  rule,  and  one  so  perfectly 
simple  and  susceptible  of  easy  application,  as 
the  friends  have  maintained.  The  dealins^s 
of  the  infinite  God  are  not  regulated  upon  a 
principle  so  obvious  as  to  be  level  to  the  hum- 
blest understanding.    On  the  contrary,  they  are 


236  JOB    REFUTES    HIS    FRIENDS. 

enveloped  in  the  profoundest  mystery.  It  Is 
impossible  to  lift  the  veil  which  obscures  His 
designs,  or  to  penetrate  the  reasons  which  gov- 
ern the  divine  proceedings.  This  is  not  because 
there  is  no  reason  in  them,  and  wild  confusion 
reigns.  The  impossibility  of  discovering  the 
divine  order  does  not  arise  from  the  absence  of 
any  real  order  in  the  universe.  The  world  is 
not  under  the  dominion  of  chance,  swinging  at 
random  to  and  fro,  without  an  aim,  without 
intelligent  oversight,  a  ship  without  chart  or 
compass  or  rudder,  tossed  by  the  waves  and 
driven  by  the  winds.  Nor  is  it  under  the  blind 
sway  of  inexorable  fate.  Nor  has'  it  been  sur- 
rendered to  the  mere  control  of  physical  laws, 
working  out  their  fixed  and  uniform  sequences 
with  a  relentless  disregard  of  any  thing  but  in- 
herent material  properties,  which,  with  undevi- 
ating  precision,  pursue  each  their  own  affinities, 
but  own  no  superintending  control,  and  are  sub- 
ordinated to  no  high  moral  aims  and  to  no  end 
superior  to  themselves.  Nor  is  the  Ruler  of 
the  world  a  capricious  tyrant,  whose  absolute 
power  is  directed  by  mere  arbitrary  will,  but 


JOB    REFUTES    HIS    FRIENDS.  237 

with  no  wise  forethought,  no  well  considered 
and  worthy  purpose. 

Infinite  wisdom  reigns  throughout  the  uni- 
verse. He  who  adjusted  the  physical  forces  of 
external  nature  with  such  admirable  precision, 
who  balanced  their  action  with  such  delicate 
nicety,  that  perfect  equilibrium  is  maintained, 
and  no  derangement  ensues  in  the  onward 
movement  of  all  this  complicated  machinery 
through  successive  ages,  —  He  who  established 
and  perpetuates  this  universal  harmony  in  all 
material  things,  giving  their  weight  to  the  winds 
and  their  measure  to  the  waters,  orders  with 
equal  wisdom  the  multitudinous  affairs  of  men. 
There  is  a  divine  method.  There  is  an  infinite 
plan,  and  it  is  one  that  is  worthy  of  the  su- 
preme intelligence ;  it  bears  throughout  the 
stamp  of  consummate  wisdom.  But  it  is  past 
finding  out. 

We  cannot  attain  to  a  comprehension  of  it. 
We  cannot  see  how  its  several  parts  cohere 
with  each  other,  or  how  they  consist  with  the 
perfections  of  Him  who  designed  it  and  who  is 
conducting  it.     There  is  much  that,  to  human 


238  JOB    REFUTES    HIS    FRIENDS. 

view,  seems  to  be  at  variance  with  a  well  or- 
dered administration.     There  is  much  that  we 
cannot  account  for,  much  that  we  cannot  un- 
derstand.    There  are  many  things  in  the  man- 
agement of  the  world  that  completely  baffle 
every  attempt  to  unriddle  them.     We  cannot 
see  why  they  are,  nor  why  God  permits  them, 
nor   how  He   can  consistently  permit   them. 
With  our  limited  understandings  and  our  re- 
stricted range  of  observation,  we  cannot  pretend 
to  fathom  the  bottomless  deep,  nor  measure 
-what  has  no  bound.     We  cannot,  even  by  the 
most  prolonged  search  or  the  most  elaborate 
investigation,  attain  to  a  thorough  understand- 
ing of  God's  infinite  designs.     Wisdom  rules 
in  all,  a  wisdom  more  valuable  than  gold,  and 
above  the  price  of  rubies.     But  the  keenest  in- 
sight and  the  most  indefatigable  application  of 
the  human  faculties  fail  to  discover  it.     The 
secret  that  resolves  all  mysteries,  harmonizes 
all  strifes,  reconciles  all  contradictions,  and  re- 
duces this  seemingly  inextricable  confusion  to 
perfect  symmetry  and  order,  is  hidden  in  the 
infinite  mind  alone. 


JOB    REFUTES    HIS    FRIENDS.  239 

Man  can  never  aspire  to  a  comprehension 
of  the  absolute  wisdom.  But  the  Most  High 
has  in  condescending  mercy  revealed  to  him 
all  that  is  necessary  for  his  practical  guidance. 
He  may  not  presume  to  know  how  God  gov- 
erns the  world,  or  what  rules  He  prescribes  for 
His  own  procedure ;  but  he  has  been  suffi- 
ciently taught  how  to  direct  his  own  conduct 
and  to  2:overn  his  own  life.  He  cannot  solve 
the  mysteries  of  Providence ;  but  he  may,  by 
taking  heed  to  the  lessons  given  him,  solve  what 
is  of  more  immediate  moment  to  him,  all  ques- 
tions of  personal  duty.  He  cannot  tell  the  end, 
which  is  subserved  by  every  thing  which  God 
permits  or  brings  to  pass  ;  but  he  need  be  in  no 
doubt  how  to  accomplish  the  true  end  of  his 
own  being  and  to  secure  his  own  higliest  wel- 
fare. "  The  fear  of  the  Lord,  that  is  wisdom ; 
and  to  depart  from  evil  is  understanding." 

Job  here  pauses,  as  he  had  done  once  be- 
fore, for  his  friends  to  make  reply,  if  they  have 
any  thing  further  to  say.  Whether  on  ac- 
count of  his  obstinate  persistence  in  his  own 
views  they  think  that  it  will  be  of  no  use  to 

11 


240  JOB    REFUTES    HIS    FRIENDS. 

argue  further,  or  whether  they  begin  themselves 
to  suspect  the  unsoundness  of  their  position, 
and  to  perceive  that  there  is  more  of  mystery 
in  the  case  of  their  suffering  friend  than  they 
had  imagined,  they  at  any  rate  say  nothing. 
And  Job  proceeds  to  state  at  length  the 
unsolved  enigma  of  his  sorrows.  His  friends 
have  shed  no  light  upon  this  distressing  dis- 
pensation, and  he  can  get  none  himself.  He 
dwells  upon  his  former  happy  condition,  then 
recites  the  dismal  reverse  which  he  has  ex- 
perienced, and  finally,  in  the  most  solemn 
manner,  affirms  his  innocence  of  any  crime 
which  could  account  for  his  being  treated 
thus. 

The  words  of  Job  are  here  ended.  He 
stands  face  to  face  with  a  mystery  that  is  thus 
far  wholly  unexplained.  He  has  no  theoiy, 
and  can  imagine  none  upon  which  his  present 
sorrows  can  be  accounted  for.  His  friends 
undertook  to  silence  his  complaint,  but  he  has 
silenced  them.  He  holds  fast  to  his  faith  in 
God,  but  he  does  so  notwithstanding  troubled 
questionings,  of  which  he  cannot  rid  himself, 


JOB    REFUTES    HIS    FRIENDS.  24I 

that  have  arisen  in  his  soul,  and  notwithstanding 
the  presence  of  facts  which  he  can  neither 
escape  nor  explain  away,  and  which  seem  to 
be  in  direct  contrariety  with  the  divine  attri- 
butes. "  Therefore,"  as  he  gloomily  said,  xxiii. 
15,  16,  "  am  I  troubled  at  His  presence :  when 
I  consider,  I  am  afraid  of  Him.  For  God 
maketh  my  heart  soft,  and  the  Almighty 
troubleth  me."  Uneasy  apprehensions  mingle 
with  his  thoughts  of  God,  w^hich  he  is  unable 
to  still.  There  is  an  unrest  in  his  soul,  which 
he  cannot  compose.  Satan  has  not  been  able 
to  destroy  him,  but  he  has  plunged  him  into 
darkness  and  distress,  out  of  which  he  cannot 
find  his  way.  His  pious  trust  continues.  He 
still  confides  in  his  Redeemer,  who  after  his 
skin  IS  destroyed,  and  his  flesh  has  mouldered 
back  to  dust,  will  reveal  Himself  to  his  disem- 
bodied spirit.  But  will  God  suffer  his  servant 
to  go  on  in  darkness  to  the  end,  bearing  his 
heavy  burden,  and  hoping  against  hope? 
Must  Job  die  under  the  cloud  ? 


CHAPTER  VIII. 


Then  was  kindled  the  wrath  of  ElUm  the  son  of 
Earache  I  the  Biczite,  of  the  kindred  of  Ram  ;  against 
Job  was  his  wrath  kindled,  because  he  justified  him- 
self  rather  than  God.  Also  against  his  three  friends 
was  his  wrath  kiiidled,  because  they  Jiad found  no 
answer,  and  yet  had  condemned  Job.  —  Job  xxxii. 
2,  3. 


ELIHU. 


nPHE  three  friends  of  Job  cannot  answer 
him,  and  yet  it  is  plain  that  he  ought  to 
be  answered.  He  has  silenced  his  friends,  and 
has  shown  that  the  principle  which  they  have 
so  confidently  urged  will  not  explain  the 
mystery  of  God's  dealings  in  general,  nor  solve 
the  enigma  of  his  own  case.  But  he  has  not 
brought  the  question  to  any  satisfactory  issue, 
nor  to  one  in  which  it  can  be  properly  left. 
The  friends  undertook  to  justify  God's  provi- 
dential dealings  :  the  failure  of  their  argument 
apparently  leaves  the  divine  proceedings  open 
to  censure  and  without  any  adequate  vindica- 
tion. They  aimed  to  show  Job  that  he  had 
no  right  to  complain  of  the  sufferings  which 
God  had  sent  upon  him  or  permitted  to  be- 


246  ELIHU. 

fall  him,  and  they  were  not  successful  in  their 
endeavor.  Job  has  triumphantly  maintained 
his  ground  in  his  controversy  with  his  friends  ; 
and,  in  his  victory  over  them,  there  is  danger 
of  his  entertaining  the  impression,  and  the 
impression  being  made  on  others,  that  he  is 
likewise  in  the  right  in  his  controversy  with 
the  providence  of  God.  This  dangerous  im- 
pression needs  to  be  corrected,  both  for  his 
own  sake  and  for  the  sake  of  those  to  whose 
instruction  his  great  trial,  and  the  book  that 
records  it,  was  designed  to  contribute. 

In  the  vehemence  of  his  opposition  to  his 
friends,  and  in  the  intensity  of  his  inward 
struggles,  Job  has  been  betrayed  into  expres- 
sions, which  cannot  be  approved,  in  which  he 
seems  to  arraign  the  equity  of  the  divine 
administration.  Great  consideration  is  re- 
quisite in  judging  of  these  expressions,  and  in 
estimating:  their  real  meanino^.  Allowance 
must  be  made  for  the  circumstances  in  which 
they  were  uttered.  Words  wrung  from  him 
in  the  bitterness  of  his  heart,  and  in  the 
tnmult  of  his  feelings  under  the  terrible  pres- 


ELIHU.  247 

sure  of  his  sorrows  and  the  exasperating  treat- 
ment of  his  friends,  are  not  to  be  regarded  as 
though  they  had  been  spoken  in  cahiier  mo- 
ments. But  if  Job  had  gone  no  further  astray 
than  this,  that  in  his  desperation  and  intoler- 
able distress  he  had  occasionally  let  slip  what 
he  subsequently  regretted,  and  what  did  not 
express  his  real  state  of  mind,  no  correction 
might  have  been  deemed  necessary. 

The  fact,  however,  is  that  Job  was  involved 
in  an  irreconcilable  conflict  with  himself. 
He  was  in  a  dilemma  from  which  he  could 
not  by  any  skill  or  power  of  his  own  be  extri- 
cated. His  most  intimate  and  ineradicable 
convictions  were  seemingly  at  hopeless  vari- 
ance. On  the  one  side  was  the  conscious- 
ness of  his  own  integrity,  which  was  dearer 
to  him  than  his  life,  which  he  could  not  deny 
nor  part  with,  and  which  he  was  prepared  to 
assert  at  all  hazards.  He  knew  from  the  tes- 
timony of  his  own  conscience  that  he  was  not 
a  gross  and  wicked  offender;  and  he  made 
his  confident  appeal  to  the  Searcher  of  hearts 

for  the  uprightness  of  his  past  life.     But  how, 

11* 


248  ELIHU. 

then,  can  he  maintain  his  confidence  in  the 
justice  and  rectitude  of  God  in  His  providen- 
tial government  ?  A  God  who  lets  the  wicked 
triumph  and  who  afflicts  the  just,  how  can  He 
be  a  righteous  and  a  holy  God  ?  Job  cannot 
put  these  two  things  together,  though  he  holds 
them  both  and  will  not  abandon  either.  And 
yet,  in  the  honest  frankness  of  his  soul,  he  does 
not  and  cannot  shut  his  eyes  to  the  fact  that 
they  do  seem  to  him  to  clash.  And,  as  in  the 
guilelessness  of  his  nature  he  makes  no  con- 
cealment, what  he  feels,  he  says. 

His  controversy  with  God's  providence  is 
not  limited,  therefore,  to  a  few  passionate  out- 
bursts, which  in  moments  of  reflection  he 
would  gladly  recall.  But  it  is  forced  upon 
him  by  an  inward  necessity  which  he  cannot 
escape.  He  has  justified  his  own  integrity 
against  the  suspicions  and  accusations  of  his 
friends.  But  how  is  the  righteousness  of  God 
to  be  vindicated  ?  This  is  the  problem.  His 
friends  can  throw  no  light  upon  it,  and  he  is 
as  much  in  the  dark  as  they.  He  still  holds 
indeed,  with  an  unslackened  grasp,  his  confi- 


ELIHU.  249 

dence  in  God's  righteousness,  and  he  will  not 
let  it  go.  In  his  struggle  to  retain  this  great 
essential  truth  he  fought  his  way  through  to 
that  grand  burst  of  triumphant  trust  in  God, 
in  which  he  utters  his  faith  in  the  unseen 
without  a  particle  of  misgiving,  though  flatly 
contradictory  to  outward  sense  :  "  I  know  that 
my  Redeemer  liveth,"  and  that  the  divine  rec- 
titude now  so  mysteriously  hidden  shall  yet 
appear,  and,  though  He  suffers  me  to  perish  in 
this  world.  He  shall  vindicate  me  in  the  next. 
But  even  this  noble  utterance  leaves  the  black 
clouds  of  the  present  undispersed.  The  right- 
eousness of  God  shall  shine  forth  radiantly 
hereafter,  but  why  is  it  so  strangely  obscured 
now?  This  Job  cannot  answer;  and,  though 
his  trust  abides  in  God's  ultimate  justice,  it  is 
after  all  a  trust  in  a  God  who  has  hidden  Him- 
self. 

A  glimpse  into  one  design,  at  least,  of  this 
infliction,  has  been  afforded  to  the  readers  of 
the  book  at  the  outset,  in  what  is  there  said  of 
the  agency  of  Satan  in  bringing  it  about.  This 
arch-fiend  plots  the  ruin  of  Job.    Quite  discred- 


250  ELIHU. 

iting  the  reality  of  goodness,  he  lays  a  snare, 
which  he  boastingly  affirms  will  be  effectual  in 
overthrowing  this  godly  man,  and  bringing  him 
to  abjure  the  service  of  his  Maker.  The  Lord 
permits  the  tempter  to  try  his  arts  to  the  full ; 
and  the  result  is  his  complete  discomfiture. 
Hardly  beset  as  Job  was,  and  driven  to  the 
most  desperate  straits,  he  nevertheless  holds 
fast  his  trust  in  God,  and  succeeds  in  trampling 
the  temptation  under  foot.  And  thus  it  is  when- 
ever the  malice  of  evil  spirits  and  the  rage  of 
wicked  men  are  allowed  to  assail  the  saints  of 
God,  in  order  to  the  more  complete  exhibition 
of  the  reality  and  power  of  their  pious  fear. 
God's  martyrs,  suffering  for  their  attachment 
to  their  blessed  Lord,  and  adhering  to  Him  in 
spite  of  all  that  can  be  employed  to  turn  them 
from  their  fidelity,  illustrate  the  reality  of  god- 
liness, and  glorify  God  in  the  fires.  We  see 
Satan's  design  in  Job's  distresses,  and  how 
conspicuously  it  was  foiled.  But  what  did 
the  Lord  intend  by  them  ?  This  has  not  yet 
been  stated.  Nevertheless,  we  cannot  con- 
ceive otherwise  than  that  He  had  a  design  of 


ELIHU.  251 

His  own  in  permitting  Satan  to  make  this  fu- 
rious onset  upon  Job.  This  cannot  have  been 
to  gratify  Satan's  spleen,  with  which  the  Lord 
had  no  sympathy ;  nor  can  it  have  been  that 
God  needed  such  a  test  to  satisfy  Himself  of 
the  reality  of  Job's  piety,  which  He  knew  as 
thoroughly  before  the  trial  as  after  it,  and  to 
which  he  had  already  borne  unqualified  testi- 
mony ;  nor  can  we  suppose  that  God  would 
have  allowed  such  overwhelming  distresses  to 
befall  His  faithful  servant,  merely  to  convince 
Satan  of  the  falsity  of  his  unreasonable  and 
malicious  su2:2:estion.  God  must  have  had  a 
purpose  of  His  own  in  all  this,  and  which  did 
not  terminate  upon  others,  but  directly  affected 
Job  himself.  God  would  not  have  made  of 
His  servant  a  passive  instrument  for  accom- 
plishing something  in  which  his  proper  per- 
son and  his  own  interests  were  wholly  disre- 
Gfarded.  He  would  not  have  made  him  suffer 
as  a  mere  spectacle  for  others,  w^ien  there  was 
no  end  to  be  answered  affecting  himself. 
There  must  have  been  some  end,  which,  so 
far  as  Job  himself  was  concerned,  would  be  an 


252  ELIHU. 

ample  justification  of  the  providence  of  God 
in  permitting  him  to  be  treated  as  he  was,  and 
to  suffer  as  he  did. 

Some  inkhng  of  the  divine  purpose  may  be 
already  gathered  from  what  has  thus  far  taken 
place.  We  have  already  seen  how  trium- 
phantly Job  bore  the  severe  and  searching 
test  applied  to  him.  And  we  may  be  sure 
that  the  desperate  struggle,  through  which  he 
passed,  has  developed  and  strengthened  his 
piety.  Job  has  learned  to  maintain  his  faith 
under  new  and  most  difficult  circumstances. 
He  has  risen  to  a  loftier  exercise  of  faith  than 
ever  before.  With  no  external  props  and  aids, 
and  in  the  face  of  all  the  suggestions  of  out- 
ward sense,  he  was  obliged  to  maintain  him- 
self by  the  simple  putting  forth  of  faith  in 
the  unseen.  His  faith  could  not  but  gather 
strength  and  clearness  by  the  effort.  That 
Job  learned  to  say  with  such  positiveness,  "  I 
know  that  my  Redeemer  liveth,"  in  spite  of 
all  that  conspired  to  extinguish  his  hopes 
and  quench  his  pious  trust,  was  attended  with 
a  positive   and  decided    spiritual    gain.       He 


ELIHU.  253 

was  lifted  thereby  into  a  higher  spiritual 
sphere. 

And  associated  with  or  growing  out  of  this 
new  elevation  and  increase  of  Job's  faith  is  the 
fresh  enlargement  of  his  spiritual  perceptions, 
and  his  keener  insight  into  religious  truth. 
In  groping  eagerly  about  for  something  to 
lean  upon,  for  something  to  support  his  soul 
in  this  time  of  his  deep  distress,  he  grasps 
the  firm  pillar  of  his  immortality,  and  puts 
it  into  a  connection  previously  unknown  or 
unthought  of  with  his  present  needs.  A  new 
element  of  truth  is  won  in  the  struggle,  a  new 
ground  for  the  tempted  to  stand  upon,  a  well- 
spring  of  consolation  to  thirsty,  fainting  souls. 

Still,  though  we  may  gather  something  by 
inference  respecting  the  design  of  God  in  this 
mysterious  and  clouded  providence,  we  feel 
the  need  of  some  authoritative  disclosure  of 
this  design.  We  feel  this  need  likewise  and 
particularly  for  Job's  sake,  and  for  those  who 
are  to  be  instructed  by  his  example,  that  the 
question  raised  between  him  and  his  friends 
should  be  set  at  rest,  that  the  truth  should  be 


254  ELIHU. 

distinctly  stated  which  they  have  both  vainly 
essayed  to  discover,  that  the  antagonistic  prin- 
ciples in  Job's  soul  should  be  composed,  and 
that  the  divine  rectitude  which  has  seemed  to 
be  impugned  hitherto  should  find  a  just  and 
satisfactory  vindication. 

The  solution  of  the  perplexed  problem  is 
given  partly  by  Elihu  and  partly  by  the  Lord 
Himself.  Elihu,  who  here  appears  for  the 
first  time,  and  whose  descent  is  somewhat  par- 
ticularly described  as  well  as  his  motive  for 
speaking,  first  addresses  Job  in  a  series  of 
chapters,  pausing  at  intervals  apparently  for 
the  sake  of  affording  an  opportunity  for  a 
reply,  if  Job  was  disposed  to  make  any.  Job, 
however,  says  nothing.  Then  the  Lord  speaks 
to  Job  out  of  the  whirlwind,  and  finally  brings 
the  whole  matter  to  a  termination  by  restor- 
ing Job  to  more  than  his  former  prosperity. 

No  portion  of  this  book  has  proved  more 
embarrassing  than  the  discourse  of  Elihu,  and 
in  regard  to  none  has  there  been  a  greater 
diversity  of  views.  There  has  been  a  wide 
divergence  of  opinion  from  very  early  times  as 


ELIHU.  255 

to  the  part  which  is  assigned  to  him,  or  why 
he  is  introduced  at  all ;  in  what  relation  the 
solution  of  the  enigma  afforded  by  him  stands 
to  that  which  is  furnished  by  the  Lord,  or  why 
two  solutions  are  given  instead  of  only  one. 
The  perplexity  is  increased  by  the  difficulty  on 
the  one  hand  of  harmonizing  what  Elihu  says 
with  the  lessons  to  be  drawn  from  the  discourse 
of  the  Lord,  and  on  the  other  of  discriminat- 
ing in  a  clear  and  satisfactory  manner  between 
the  sentiments  propounded  by  Elihu  and 
those  w^hich  had  been  previously  advanced  by 
Job's  three  friends. 

Many  have  concluded  that  the  lessons 
taught  by  Elihu  and  the  Lord  are  hopelessly 
at  variance,  while  the  doctrine  of  Elihu  and 
the  three  friends  is  identical ;  and,  conse- 
quently, that  what  he  says  contributes  nothing 
toward  the  true  and  proper  settlement  of  the 
question  at  issue.  The  solution  which  he 
offers  of  the  enigmas  of  Providence  is  alleged 
to  be  substantially  that  of  Eliphaz  and  his 
associates,  and  accordingly  open  to  the  same 
condemnation,  and  to  be  regarded  as  set  aside 


256  ELIHU. 

by  the  subsequent  decision  rendered  by  the 
Lord  Himself,  which  is  alone  to  be  accepted 
as  the  true  solution,  and  the  one  which  ade- 
quately meets  the  case.  On  this  hypothe- 
sis Job  does  not  reply  to  Elihu,  because  he 
really  advances  nothing  new,  and  nothing 
which  he  had  not  sufficiently  answered  be- 
fore. And  the  Lord  makes  no  allusion  to 
him,  because  he  is  a  mere  intruder  who  has 
said  nothing  deserving  of  special  regard  ;  and 
he  is,  moreover,  involved  in  the  censure  passed 
upon  the  friends,  whose  tenets  he  had  simply 
repeated. 

Among  those  who  hold  this  view  there  is 
still  a  diversity  of  judgment  as  to  the  ability 
displayed  by  Elihu  in  the  presentation  of  his 
argument.  In  the  opinion  of  some  he  is  a 
shallow  pretender,  a  vain  and  conceited  up- 
start, intruding  his  weak  opinions  unsolicited, 
where  wiser  and  better  men  had  already 
exhausted  that  side  of  the  question  and  spoken 
with  more  force  than  he  is  able  to  do.  Others 
concede  to  his  argument  distinguished  merit, 
and  think  that  his  several  points  are  put  with 


ELIHU.  257 

great  skill  and  cogency.  They  consider  him 
the  exponent  of  human  reason,  representing 
the  highest  results  to  which  it  is  capable  of 
attaining  without  an  immediate  divine  revela- 
tion. He  fails  to  give  the  true  solution  of  the 
mysterious  problems  of  divine  providence,  but 
he  only  does  so  because  they  are  not  within 
the  grasp  of  man's  unaided  intellect.  God 
ca.n  alone  give  the  correct  answer  where  the 
wisest  and  most  sagacious  of  men  are  incom- 
petent to  discover  the  truth.  The  failure  of 
Elihu  to  advance  the  settlement  of  the  question 
beyond  the  point  at  which  the  friends  had  left 
it  is  thus  supposed  to  render  still  more  palpable 
the  necessity  for  the  Lord  Himself  to  inter- 
vene, if  the  matter  is  ever  to  be  put  upon  its 
proper  basis. 

It  seems  highly  improbable,  however,  that 
so  much  space  would  be  devoted  to  a  person- 
age who  really  contributes  nothing  whatever 
to  the  design  of  the  book,  and  only  repeats 
what  the  friends  had  already  substantially  said 
before.  This  view,  therefore,  very  naturally 
paved  the  way  for  another  which  has  also  had 


\ 


258  ELIHU. 

not  a  few  advocates,  that  the  speech  of  Ehhu 
forms  no  part  of  the  book  as  originally  written, 
but  is  an  addition  by  a  later  hand.  This,  as 
some  think,  mars  the  symmetry  and  complete- 
ness of  the  work,  or,  according  to  others,  adds 
fresh  and  valuable  thoughts,  but  such  as  did 
not  enter  into  the  plan  of  the  original  writer. 

The  difficulties  which  have  been  felt  with 
regard  to  Elihu  will,  we  are  persuaded,  disap- 
pear, and  the  hypotheses  already  referred  to, 
which  are  built  upon  them,  will  vanish  upon  a 
more  careful  study  of  the  speech  attributed  to 
him,  and  of  the  language  with  which  he  is 
introduced.  It  is  plain  that  the  writer  of  the 
book  does  not  regard  him  as  siding  with  the 
Jriends  in  their  controversy  with  Job.  He 
represents  him  as  equally  displeased  with  the 
positions  of  both  the  contending  parties. 
"  Against  Job  was  his  wrath  kindled,  because 
he  justified  himself  rather  than  God.  And 
against  his  three  friends  was  his  wrath  kindled, 
because  the);  had  found  no  answer,  and  yet  had 
condemned  Job."  He  accordingly  steps  forth 
as  an  arbiter,  and  puts  the   question   at  issue 


ELIHU.  259 

upon  entirely  new  ground.  He  agrees,  to 
be  sure,  with  the  friends  in  some  of  their 
positions,  which  as  general  statements  were 
quite  correct.  But  his  fundamental  tenet 
is  totally  different  from  theirs,  as  will  be  seen 
presently. 

Elihu  is  not  spoken  of  in  the  beginning  of 
the  book,  when  the  arrival  of  the  three  friends 
is  mentioned,  because  there  was  no  occasion  for 
speaking  of  him  then.  He  only  engages  in 
the  dispute  because  the  three  friends  have 
failed  to  find  a  satisfactory  answer  to  Job  ;  and 
to  refer  to  him  in  the  outset  would  have  been 
to  anticipate  their  incapacity  to  deal  with  the 
subject  before  they  had  made  the  attempt.  Job 
does  not  make  answer  to  Elihu  as  he  had  done 
to  the  friends,  because  he  is  convinced  of  the 
truth  of  what  he  says,  and  he  has  therefore 
nothing  to  reply. 

The  Lord  makes  no  allusion  to  Elihu,  when 

He  subsequently  expresses  His  approval  of  Job 

and  passes  censure  on  his  friends,  because  he 

wasjiQt-ane-of  the  parties  to  the  strife  which 

'was  to  be  adjusted -He- was-JiQt_Qae  of  the 


26o  ELIHU. 

contestants  respecting  whom  a  verdict  was  to 
be  rendered,  but  an  arbiter,  whose  decision  the 
Lord  assumes  as  preliminary  to  His  own.  It 
would  not  have  comported  with  the  divine  dig- 
nity, for  the  infinite  God  to  place  Himself  on  a 
level  with  His  dependent  creature,  and  enter 
into  an  argument  with  him  in  justification  of 
His  own  sovereign  acts,  as  though  He  were 
amenable  to  human  judgment.  As  far,  there- 
fore, as  there  was  any  occasion  for  arguing  the 
case  with  Job,  and  correcting  his  misapprehen- 
sions or  vindicating  the  divine  proceedings,  this 
was  committed  to  Elihu,  who  could  meet  Job 
as  an  equal  and  reason  out  the  case  with  him, 
showing  him  that  he  was  wrong,  and  that  God 
was  right.  This  course  was  adopted  likewise 
from  a  consideration  of  what  was  really  best 
for  Job  himself.  There  was  no  divine  terror 
to  appall  him,  no  effulgence  of  the  infinite  maj- 
esty to  overwhelm  him.  Elihu  came  as  the 
messenger  of  God  to  plead  God's  cause.  Job 
could  stand,  on  a  par  with  him  and  in  a  calm 
state  of  mind,  and  could  make  reply  without  ir- 
reverence, if  the  considerations  presented  did 


ELIHU.  261 

not  convince  his  judgment.  They  were  con- 
vincing. Job  yielded  to  his  arguments,  and  had 
no  reply  to  make.  He  tacitly  confesses  the  jus- 
tice of  all  that  Elihu  says.  His  false  views  are 
corrected ;  his  misconceptions  of  God's  provi- 
dences toward  him  and  of  the  design  of  God 
in  his  afflictions  are  removed.  The  way  is  thus 
prepared  for  the  Lord  to  appear,  and  by  the 
simple  majesty  of  His  divine  perfections  to 
make  the  needed  impression  upon  the  heart  of 
Job.  The  awe-struck  patriarch  bows  at  once  in 
submissive  penitence,  for  he  has  learned  from 
Elihu  to  see  in  God  no  longer  the  impersona- 
tion of  arbitrary  power  wielded  for  his  destruc- 
tion, but  the  God  of  grace,  in  whose  hand  even 
the  rod  of  affliction  was  a  means  of  blessing. 

It  appears  that,  though  Elihu  had  not  been 
spoken  of  before,  he  had  been  present  during 
the  discussion  between  Job  and  his  three 
friends.  He  had  said  nothing,  but  had  main- 
tained throughout  a  respectful  silence.  This 
suggests  the  probability  of  the  presence  of 
others  likewise.  The  fame  of  the  patriarch's 
sorrows    had    gone   far  and   wide.      And   as 


262  ELIHU. 

after  his  restoration  all  his  brethren,  and  all 
his  sisters,  and  all  they  that  had  been  of  his 
acquaintance,  came  unto  him  to  eat  bread 
with  him  in  his  house,  and  to  bemoan  him 
and  comfort  him  over  all  the  evil  that  the 
Lord  had  brought  upon  him  (xlii.  11);  so 
doubtless  they  did  while  his  sorrows  lasted. 
Of  this  company  of  sympathizing  friends, 
Eliphaz,  Bildad,  and  Zophar  were  the  spokes- 
men, to  whom  the  rest  deferred  as  their  supe- 
riors in  age  and  in  reputed  wisdom.  In  the 
presence  of  this  interested  group  the  discus- 
sion had  been  conducted  with  the  issue 
already  recited.  The  friends  had  shown 
themselves  unable  to  still  Jobs  complaint, 
or  to  answer  his  arguments.  They  could  only 
vindicate  the  righteousness  of  God's  provi- 
dence by  aspersing  the  character  of  His  right- 
eous servant.  So  far  it  might  appear  as 
though  Job's  complaint  were  justified.  Upon 
the  principles  of  his  friends,  and  upon  any 
theory  that  he  could  frame  for  himself,  God 
had  done  him  wTong.  He  was  treating  him 
as  though  he  were  guilty  of  offences  which  he 


ELIHU.  263 

had  not  committed.  The  mystery  that  over- 
hung the  present  case,  and  which  involved 
the  ways  of  Providence  in  general,  was  still 
unsolved.  Neither  the  friends  nor  Job  could 
penetrate  it  or  remove  it.  Must  it  remain  for- 
ever insoluble  ? 

Elihu  had  waited  in  the  expectation  that 
the  three  friends  would  bring  out  the  true 
moral  reasons  of  the  distresses  that  befall  good 
men  like  Job,  and  would  show  the  harmony 
of  the  perfections  of  God  with  His  providen- 
tial government.  As,  however,  they  failed  to 
do  this,  he  could  no  longer  be  restrained  by 
his  deference  for  these  venerable  sages,  but 
was  irresistibly  impelled  to  speak.  If  the 
surmise  be  correct,  that  the  kindred  of  Ram, 
to  which  he  is  said  to  have  belonged,  was  the 
same  as  Aram,  he  came  from  a  different  re- 
gion from  the  three  friends,  and  there  may  be 
a  significance  that  should  not  be  overlooked 
in  the  mention  of  the  fact. 

Eliphaz  and  Teman  were  names  perpetu- 
ated in  the  territory  of  Edom  (Gen.  xxxvi.  10, 
11),  and  the  Shuhite   recalls   the  children  of 


264  ELIHU. 

Keturah,  who  were  settled  in  the  East  coun- 
try (Gen.  XXV.  2,  6) :  all  belonged  to  a  region 
renowned  for  the  wisdom  and  sagacity  of  its 
inhabitants.  But  Elihu  comes,  it  may  be, 
from  a  territory  with  associations  of  a  differ- 
ent sort.  When  Balak  was  in  straits,  and  felt 
the  need  of  a  higher  than  human  help  or 
counsel,  he  sent  to  Aram  (Num.  xxiii.  7),  for 
one  who  heard  the  words  of  God,  and  knew 
the  knowledge  of  the  Most  High,  and  saw 
the  vision  of  the  Almighty  (Num.  xxiv.  16). 
It  was  from  Aram  that  Abraham  came,  the 
friend  of  God;  and  the  epithet  the  Buzite 
reminds  us  of  Buz  in  the  family  of  Nahor, 
Abraham's  brother  (Gen.  xxii.  21).  It  is  not 
impossible  that  there  may  lie  in  these  names  * 
the  suggestion  of  a  land  of  divine  intervention 

*  If  an  appropriateness  were  to  be  sought  in  the  personal 
names,  Ehphaz  might  be  explained  to  mean  God  separates 
or  divides^  and  thus  linked  with  his  fundamental  tenet  of  a 
providential  discrimination  between  the  good  and  the  bad. 
It  is  formed  from  a  verb,  which  is  used  of  separating  gold 
from  dross.  Elihu  may  mean  God  is  or  God  Hii/tself;  and  he 
gives  a  truer  doctrine  of  God,  and  one  which  more  accurately 
represents  the  divine  Being.  And  he  is  the  son  of  Bar- 
achel,  blessing  God,  or  whom  God  blesses. 


ELIHU.  265 

or  immediate  divine  revelation  as  opposed  to 
the  land  of  the  highest  earthly  wisdom.  The 
representatives  of  the  land  of  sages  first  con- 
front the  enigma,  but  are  baffled :  the  resources 
of  human  reason  are  inadequate  to  the  task. 
Then  Elihu  comes  as  the  messenger  of  God. 
He  is  but  a  youth,  with  no  pretensions  to 
superior  sagacity,  and  without  the  age  that 
ordinarily  brings  wisdom  and  experience,  but 
the  inspiration  of  the  Almighty  had  given 
him  understanding  (xxxii.  8).  And  he  un- 
ravels the  mystery  which  the  venerable  and 
the  wise  could  not  rightly  expound.  The  wis- 
dom of  man  is  at  an  utter  loss.  That  of  God 
is  alone  competent  to  relieve  the  difficulty. 
"  God   thrusteth  him   down,   not   man "   (ver. 

13)- 

Elihu  begins  with  an  apology  for  speaking 

which  may  seem  repetitious  and  prolix.  But 
this  arises  from'  the  diffidence  of  youth  and 
inexperience  in  the  presence  of  aged  and  ven- 
erable men,  which  made  him  feel  as  though 
he  could  not  affirm  too  strongly  nor  repeat 
too  often  his  reluctance  to  obtrude  himself  or 


266  ELIHU. 

his  own  views  upon  them,  while  yet  an  inward 
constraint  that  he  could  not  resist  compelled 
him  to  declare  the  truth  which  had  not  thus 
far  been  uttered,  and  to  return  the  proper  an- 
swer to  Job,  which  had  not  yet  been  given. 
He  promises  that  his  treatment  of  the  theme 
shall  be  perfectly  impartial  and  unbiassed: 
without  respect  of  persons  and  without  flattery, 
but  with  a  single  regard  to  the  judgment  of  his 
Maker,  he  will  hold  an  even  balance  between 
the  friends  and  Job.  He  proposes  to  put  the 
matter  on  an  entirely  new  basis,  one  alto- 
gether different  from  that  on  which  it  had 
been  placed  by  the  friends,  and  against  which 
Job  had  successfully  aimed  his  arguments. 
"  He  hath  not  directed  his  w^ords  against  me  : 
neither  will  I  answer  him  with  your  speeches  " 
(ver.  14). 

That  which  chiefly  distressed  Job  was  that 
God  seemed  to  be  treating  him  as  an  enemy. 
He  had  dwelt  most  pathetically  upon  this  as- 
pect of  his  case,  and  had  recited  his  dreadful 
sorrows  as  so  many  evidences  of  the  fierceness 
of  God  s  answer  and  the  bitterness  of  His  hos- 

o 


ELIHU.  267 

tillty.  It  was  this  which  was  so  unaccountable 
to  him  and  so  dreadful.  It  is  to  the  disabusing 
of  his  mind  on  this  point,  which  was  his  radical 
error,  that  Elihu  first  and  mainly  addresses 
himself.  Affliction,  he  tells  him,  is  not  a 
token  of  God's  displeasure,  but  one  of  the 
measures  of  His  grace.  It  is  not  sent  in  wrath, 
but  with  a  kind  and  merciful  design.  It  is  one 
of  the  ways  in  which  God  speaks  to  men  to 
draw  them  away  from  sin  and  to  promote  their 
highest  welfare. 

There  are  two  principal  methods,  as  he 
explains,  which  God  employs  in  dealing  with 
men,  to  detach  them  from  what  is  wrong, 
and  establish  them  in  what  is  pure  and  good  ; 
viz.,  His  word  and  His  providence.  The 
former  is  described  in  terms  appropriate  to  the 
period  when  Job  lived,  prior  to  a  written  reve- 
lation, and  allusive  to  one  of  the  most  usual 
forms  in  which  immediate  divine  communica- 
tions were  then  made  (xxxiii.  15,  etc.).  "  In  a 
dream,  in  a  vision  of  the  night,  when  deep 
sleep  falleth  upon  men,  in  slumberings  upon 
the  bed;  them  He  openeth  the  ears  of  men 


268  ELIHU. 

and  sealeth  their  Instruction,  that  He  may- 
withdraw  man  from  his  purpose,  and  hide 
pride  from  man."  By  these  sacred  instruc- 
tions He  saves  him  from  sin,  and  from  the 
punishment  which  sin  would  involve.  "He 
keepeth  back  his  soul  from  the  pit,  and  his 
life  from  perishing  by  the  sword."  Now,  as 
he  further  goes  on  to  say,  God  uses  affliction 
for  the  same  Q:racious  end.  He  sends  sickness 
and  suffering  to  recall  men  to  the  path  of 
uprightness.  And  then  if  the  sufferer  recog- 
nizes this  merciful  intent  of  his  sorrows,  and 
yields  himself  up  to  it,  his  pains  will  be  re- 
moved. Their  whole  design  will  be  accom- 
plished, and  they  will  be  needed  no  more. 

This  is  an  entirely  new  doctrine,  and  ex- 
hibits the  matter  under  a  totally  different 
aspect.  The  friends  had  seen  in  suffering 
nothing  but  the  punishment  of  sin,  and  the 
divine  displeasure  against  it.  To  Job's  mind 
it  was  an  arbitrary  infliction,  irrespective  of 
men's  deserts.  But  the  idea  of  a  gracious 
purpose  in  earthly  distresses,  the  idea  that  they 
betoken  the  divine  benignity  and  love,  and  are 


'  '  ELIHU.  269 

meant  to  accomplish  a  kindly  end,  had  not 
dawned  upon  either  of  them.  Eliphaz  indeed 
in  his  first  and  most  gentle  speech  approaches 
so  nearly  to  it,  and  uses  expressions  so  akin  to 
those  of  Elihu,  that  to  a  hasty  and  superficial 
view  their  doctrine  might  appear  identical. 
He  speaks  (v.  17)  of  the  blessedness  of  the 
man  whom  God  correctetli,  and  bids  Job  not 
to  despise  the  chastening  of  the  Almighty. 
"  For  He  maketh  sore,  and  bindeth  up :  He 
woundeth,  and  His  hands  make  whole."  This 
looks  to  the  possibility  of  good  results  follow- 
ing upon  affliction,  which  may  so  far  counter- 
balance the  evil  that  he  may  be  pronounced 
happy  who  endures  it.  And  God  who  now 
sends  sorrow  may  hereafter  send  joy.  Never- 
theless suffering  is  to  Eliphaz  in  its  proper 
nature  punitive,  and  represents  God's  dis- 
pleasure against  sin ;  while  in  the  estimate 
of  Elihu  it  is  curative,  and  represents  God's 
affectionate  concern  for  the  true  welfare  of 
the  sufferer.  The  two  ideas  are  wide  as  the 
poles  asunder.  On  the  one  view,  God  in 
afflicting  a  man  regards  him  as  a  sinner,  and 


270  ELIHU. 

treats  him  as  such  :  his  sufferings  are  tanta- 
mount to  a  sentence  of  condemnation.  On  the 
other,  God  regards  rather  his  capacity  for  good- 
ness, and  seeks  his  purification  and  improve- 
ment. The  development  of  the  doctrine  of 
the  friends  led  directly  to  their  gross  and 
unfounded  charges  of  hypocrisy  and  guilt. 
That  of  Elihu  is  perfectly  consistent  with 
Job's  true  character  as  affirmed  by  God  Him- 
self; and  it  quite  disarms  Job,  by  showing  that 
he  has  been  neither  unkindly  nor  unjustly 
dealt  with.  God  is  not  treating  him  as  a 
criminal  nor  as  a  foe,  as  he  supposed,  but  is 
showing  a  solicitous  regard  for  his  highest 
good. 

The  suggestion  of  Elihu  as  to  the  divine 
purpose  in  suffering  is  additional  to  that  which 
is  stated  in  the  opening  of  the  book  as  the 
occasion  of  the  sorrows  of  Job ;  but  it  is  not 
inconsistent  with  it,  nor  is  it  excluded  by  it. 
Though  it  was  permitted  at  the  instigation 
of  Satan,  who  sought  Job's  hurt,  it  does  not 
follow  that  the  Lord  had  no  designs  of  His 
own  in  granting  the  permission.     Undoubt- 


ELIHU.  271 

edly  one  design  of  God  was  to  exhibit  the 
reality  of  Job's  piety,  and  its  adequacy  to  bear 
the  test,  terrible  as  it  was,  which  Satan  pro- 
posed. But  nothing  obliges  us  to  believe 
that  God's  merciful  purpose  was  simply  com- 
mensurate with  the  mischievous  intention  of 
the  fiend,  and  that  it  was  limited  to  thwart- 
ing and  defeating  the  harm  concocted  for 
His  servant.  Why  may  He  not  likewise 
have  had  positive  designs  of  good,  which 
Satan's  malice  was  by  overruling  grace  to 
be  made  the  instrument  of  effecting  ?  Elihu 
declares  that  He  had.  And  we  have  already 
seen  good  evolving  to  Job  out  of  this  seem- 
ing evil ;  and  there  is  yet  more  to  be  brought 
out  of  it  hereafter.  Job  is  purified  and  in- 
structed :  his  piety  is  heightened,  and  his 
knowledge  of  divine  things  is  increased  by 
this  affliction.  So  that  the  doctrine  of  Elihu, 
far  from  conflicting  with  the  rest  of  the  book, 
finds  in  it  ample  justification  and  support. 
It  was  the  purpose  of  God  from  the  first  to 
bless  Job  by  means  of  this  trial.  And  al- 
though this  purpose  has  not  been  previously 

12* 


272  ELIHU. 

announced,  until  it  is  formally  stated  by 
Elihu,  it  is  already  gradually  working  itself 
out,  and  we  shall  see  fuller  fruits  of  it  in  that 
which  follows. 

That  Job  was  put  on  trial  was  not  stated 
to  himself,  for  it  was  not  the  truth  he  needed 
to  hear.  But  now  that  he  has  successfully 
borne  the  test,  he  needs  to  know  the  end  of 
this  infliction,  not  so  far  as  Satan  was  con- 
cerned, but  its  end  for  himself.  He  needs  to 
know  that  it  was  sent  with  a  gracious  design, 
and  that  it  enclosed  a  real  benefit.  It  was 
necessary  that  he  should  understand  this,  in 
order  that  he  might  be  thoroughly  released 
out  of  the  tempter's  snare,  and  might  receive 
the  full  profit  that  was  in  store  for  him. 

Elihu's  doctrine  of  suffering  is  not  ham- 
pered by  the  rigid  and  inflexible  rule  of  exact 
retributive  justice  maintained  by  the  friends ; 
nor  does  it  conflict^  as  that  did,  with  the  gen- 
eral facts  of  Providence  or  with  the  conscious- 
ness of  Job.  Job's  arguments  and  protests 
against  the  friends  do  not  lie  against  it.  It 
is  a  view,  in  fact,  a^rainst  which  he  has  no  dis- 


ELIHU.  273 

position  either  to  argue  or  to  protest.  It  is 
not  only  consistent  with,  but  gives  a  satisfac- 
tory account  of  the  inequalities  of  human 
condition.  The  unbending  rule  of  strict  jus- 
tice would  have  required  a  uniform  and  pre- 
cise correspondence  of  men's  fortunes  with 
their  characters.  It  admitted  of  no  devia- 
tion. There  might,  indeed,  be  temporary  de- 
lays. The  divine  retribution  might  be  for  a 
while  postponed,  but  it  must  never  fail  to  be 
ultimately  and  palpably  meted  out  to  all,  in 
the  true  proportion  of  their  merits  and  de- 
merits. 

But  a  gracious  purpose  is  from  its  very 
nature  free :  it  can  be  bound  by  no  rule  but 
the  disposition  and  will  of  him  who  exercises 
it.  The  only  limitation  upon  a  providence 
so  conducted  is  God's  good  pleasure ;  and 
none  can  prescribe  in  advance  where  He 
shall  send  joy  or  where  He  shall  send  sor- 
row. He  may  by  His  goodness  lead  men 
to  repentance.  He  may  employ  chastise- 
ment to  wean  them  from  the  love  of  this 
world  or  to  turn  their  hearts  from  sin.     The 


2  74  ELIHU. 

method  employed  in  each  particular  Instance 
depends  solely  upon  His  sovereign  will. 
This  admits  all  the  free  variety  found  In 
the  actual  experience  of  men,  while  at  the 
same  time  It  neither  divorces  the  world  from 
God  nor  represents  His  dealings  as  capri- 
cious and  arbitrary.  He  without  whom  not 
a  sparrow^  falls  numbers  the  hairs  of  our 
heads,  directs  all  that  concerns  us,  appoints 
all  our  lot.  He  governs  In  all  the  affairs  of 
men,  and  He  does  so  In  a  manner  worthy  of 
Himself.  There  Is  a  method  In  all  that  oc- 
curs, and  a  purpose  and  a  divine  Intelligence. 
Providence  Is  harmonized  with  the  Infinite 
rectitude  and  the  universal  moral  government. 
It  becomes  In  fact  the  expression,  the  visible 
manifestation  of  God's  holiness  as  well  as  of 
His  grace ;  for  It  is  directed  with  the  view  of 
reclaiming  men  from  sin  and  training  them 
in  holiness  and  virtue.  It  Is  not  graduated 
by  any  formal  mechanical  rule  of  correspond- 
ence with  men's  deserts,  but  it  is  wisely 
adapted,  nevertheless,  to  their  multiform 
needs    by    Him    whose    resources   are   end- 


ELIHU.  275 

less,  and  whose  understanding  is  without  a 
bound. 

This  doctrine  Hkewise  suppHes  the  hitherto 
undiscovered  key  to  the  enigma  of  Job's  suf- 
ferings. No  reflection  is  cast  upon  his  integrity 
or  the  genuineness  of  his  piety.  His  afflic- 
tions are  neither  an  indication  of  the  Lord's 
displeasure  nor  of  His  wanton  hostility.  A 
gracious  God  is  by  this  severity  of  discipline 
purging  away  the  dross  which  still  adhered  to 
His  faithful  servant,  and  refining  the  gold  to  a 
higher  measure  of  purity. 

Accordingly,  \fhen  Elihu  pauses  in  his  dis- 
course (xxxiii.  32)  to -afford  Job  an  opportunity 
for  reply,  he  makes  none.  He  has  nothing  to 
say  in  opposition  to  what  he  has  heard.  He 
has  no  answer  to  make.  It  has  wrought  con- 
viction in  his  soul.  It  has  composed  the  strife 
which  previously  agitated  him.  It  has  recon- 
ciled the  conflicting  opposites.  It  harmonizes 
his  convictions  respecting  God  with  what  has 
hitherto  been  inexplicable  in  His  providence. 
It  makes  all  plain  in  his  own  case,  which  has 
thus  far  been  so  dark  and  impenetrable.     God 


276  ELIHU. 

has  not  been  impeaching  his  integrity  by  these 
terrible  sufferings  which  He  has  inflicted  or 
permitted.  God  has  not  been  charging  upon 
him  a  guilt  of  which  the  testimony  of  his  own 
conscience  acquits  him.  Nor  has  He  been 
treating  him  with  causeless  and  gratuitous  se- 
verity. There  is  no  hostile  intent  on  the  part 
of  God :  all  has  been  done  in  kindness  and  in 
love.  The  truth  evidences  itself  to  him  by  its 
adaptation  to  all  the  exigencies  of  the  case  in 
hand.  It  finds  a  prompt  echo  in  Job's  own 
heart,  and  he  bo^vs  in  mute  acquiescence  to 
the  force  of  what  has  been  said.  He  is  no 
longer  roused  to  opposition  as  by  the  language 
of  his  friends,  whom  he  has  reduced  to  silence. 
He  is  now  himself  silenced  in  his  ,turn.  He 
owns  and  feels  the  justice  and  propriety  of  the 
view  which  has  been  propounded,  and  he  lis- 
tens in  silent  acknowledofment  of  its  truth. 
Elihu  has  not  only  gained  his  ear,  but  his 
heart ;  and  the  solution  of  the  mystery,  which 
has  so  baffled  and  perplexed  him,  begins  to 
open  before  him. 

Having  established  his  main  position,  Elihu 


ELIHU.  277 

proceeds  (xxxiv.,  xxxv.)  to  comment  upon 
some  of  Job's  ill-considere'd  and  hasty  utter- 
ances, which  fell  from' him  in  the  heat  of  his 
controversy  with  his  friends.  They  were  in- 
cessantly representing  the  justice  of  God  as 
hopelessly  at  war  with  the  idea  of  the  integrity 
of  Job.  Not  seeing,  in  the  desperate  gloom 
that  enveloped  him,  how  this  conclusion  was 
to  be  escaped,  Job  boldly  admits  it,  and  in  the 
thorough  consciousness  of  his  own  rectitude  is 
driven  to  affirm  that  God  has  done  him  wrong. 
But  now  that  this  antagonism  has  been  done 
away  by  the  new  principle  which  Elihu  has  an- 
nounced. Job  is  no  longer  under  any  temptation 
to  dispute  the  righteousness  of  God's  providen- 
tial administration.  Elihu  accordingly  holds 
up  before  him  some  of  his  most  extravagant 
assertions,  and  points  out  their  absurdity  and 
impropriety.  In  saying  (xxxiv.  5  ;  comp.  xxvii.  2), 
"God  hath  taken  away  my  judgment,"  de- 
spoiled me  of  my  rights,  treated  me  unjustly, 
Job  was  consorting  with  wicked  men,  and 
loosenino;  the  foundations  of  God's  universal 
government.     Shall  not  the  Judge  of  all  the 


278  ELIHU. 

earth  do  right  ?  It  is  repugnant  to  every  no- 
tion  of  propriety  to  charge  the  supreme  and 
all-perfect  Ruler  with  injustice.  If  a  conflict 
arise  between  God  and  His  creatures,  whom 
He  can  be  under  no  possible  temptation  to  in- 
jure, the  overwhelming  presumption,  nay,  the 
absolute  certainty,  is  that  He  is  right  and  they 
are  wTong,  w^hether  they  can  see  it  to  be  so  or 
not.  "  Surely  it  is  meet  to  be  said  unto  God, 
I  have  borne  chastisement,  I  will  not  offend 
any  more:  that  w^hich  I  see  not,  teach  Thou 
me :  if  I  have  done  iniquity,  I  will  do  no 
more  "  (xxxiv.  31,  32).  "  Thinkest  thou  this  to 
be  right,"  he  adds  (xxxv.  2),  "  that  thou  saidst 
[not  in  so  many  words,  indeed,  but  in  sub- 
stance]. My  righteousness  is  more  than  God  s," 
when  you  are  but  a  trifling,  insignificant 
creature,  of  no  account  compared  with  the 
infinite  Creator  .f^ 

Job  had  invariably  resented  such  language 
before  from  his  friends.  Their  appeals  to  God  s 
righteousness  always  exasperated  him,  for  the 
necessary  implication  from  it,  as  presented  by 
them,  was  that  he  was  a  guilty  man,  who  de- 


ELIHU.  279 

served  all  that  he  suffered.  Sensitive  as  he 
might  properly  be  to  unjust  imputations,  he 
was  indignant  at  these  indirect  reproaches. 
But  in  the  mouth  of  Elihu  it  is  different.  It 
contains  no  covert  censure  of  himself.  The 
assertion  of  God's  inviolable  justice  veils  no 
aspersions  or  insinuations.  The  simple  truth 
of  the  perfection  of  the  ever-blessed  God  stands 
alone  before  him  in  its  innate  majesty,  and  free 
from  all  distortions  or  false  conclusions,  and  its 
reality  cannot  but  be  confessed.  Job  cannot 
oppose  what  is  so  self-evident.  He  continues 
to  bow  in  silent  acquiescence. 

Elihu,  having  thus  corrected  Job's  errors 
and  reproved  the  rash  speeches  into  which 
he  had  in  consequence  been  betrayed,  reverts 
again  to  his  fundamental  principle  of  the 
design  of  suffering,  making  special  applica- 
tion of  it  to  the  case  of  Job,  and  basing 
upon  it  a  faithful  admonition  (xxxvi.).  Afflic- 
tions, he  repeats,  are  sent  upon  the  righteous 
for  their  good ;  and  such  an  experience  is 
fraught  with  solemn  responsibility  to  the 
afflicted  themselves.      If  they  recognize  the 


28o  ELIHU. 

gracious  purpose  of  God  in  their  sorrows,  and 
heed  the  lesson  they  involve,  then  the  design 
of  this  painful  dispensation  will  be  accom- 
plished, and  it  will  be  itself  removed.  If,  on 
the  contrary,  they  disregard  the  voice  of  love 
and  warning  which  speaks  to  them  in  these 
distresses,  they  will  incur  the  divine  dis- 
pleasure, and  bring  God's  judgment  on  them- 
selves in  the  form  of  still  heavier  sorrows 
than  they  have  yet  experienced.  Thus,  he 
tells  Job,  it  will  be  with  him.  He  might  have 
found  deliverance  already,  if  he  had  profited 
sufficiently  by  the  teachings  of  his  sad  ca- 
lamities, and  learned  from  them  to  be  more 
diligent  in  avoiding  sin,  and  to  cleave  more 
unreservedly  to  the  service  of  the  Lord. 

Elihu  has  now  fulfilled  the  task  assimed 
to  him.  He  was  charged  with  removing  mis- 
apprehensions from  Job's  mind,  and  correct- 
ing the  mistakes  into  which  he  had  fallen. 
But  it  was  not  given  to  him  to  extricate 
Job  entirely  out  of  Satan's  snare,  and  accom- 
plish for  him  the  full  and  blessed  effects  of 
his  temptation.     This  work  the  Lord  reserved 


ELIHU.  281 

for  Himself,  to  be  performed  by  Him  in  His 
own  Person.  Elihu  is  but  His  messenger 
sent  before  His  face  to  prepare  His  way 
before  Him.  And  now  even  while  he  is 
speaking  the  rumbling  is  heard  of  distant 
thunder  (xxxvii.  2) ;  heavy  masses  of  cloud 
begin  to  darken  the  sky,  and  the  advancing 
tempest  betokens  the  Lord's  approach.  Elihu 
points  to  these  insignia  of  the  divine  Majesty 
as  they  steadily  draw  near,  and  his  own  voice 
is  hushed  in  awe.  All  are  mute  in  solemn 
expectation.      It  is  the  Lord  who  comes. 


CHAPTER   IX. 


Then  the  LORD  ajtswered  Job  out  of  the  whirl- 
wind, and  said,  Who  is  this  that  darkeneth  counsel 
by  words  without  knowledge  f  — Job  xxxviii.  1,2. 


THE    LORD. 


X^^E  have  now  come  to  what  is  beyond  all 
comparison  the  most  sublime  portion 
of  this  wonderful  book.  All  the  discourses 
hitherto,  whether  of  Job  or  of  the  other 
speakers,  have  been  well  conceived  and  ad- 
mirably expressed.  They  present  their  pro- 
found and  earnest  thoughts  with  singular 
beauty  and  force.  They  glow  with  elegant 
and  appropriate  imagery.  And  they  body 
forth  in  vividly  graphic  language  the  inward 
excitement  and  changing  emotions  of  those 
by  whom  they  are  uttered.  All  had  been 
well  and  ably  spoken.  But  now  when  the 
Lord  Himself  speaks  to  Job,  His  discourse 
is  fitly  marked  by  a  grandeur  and  a  majesty 
altogether  unequalled  before,  and  which  is 
worthy  of  the  divine  Being. 


286  THE    LORD. 

It  might  upon  the  first  superficial  view  of 
the  case  appear  as  though  the  discourse  of 
the  Lord  had  no  particular  relevance  to  the 
circumstances  in  which  it  was  uttered.  And 
the  question  might  arise,  what  these  appeals 
to  the  magnificence  of  the  works  of  God  in 
nature  have  to  do  with  the  solution  of  the 
enigma,  to  which  this  book  is  devoted.  How 
do  they  contribute  to  the  explanation  of  the 
mystery  that  is  involved  in  the  sufferings  of 
good  men  ?  The  fact  is,  this  discourse  is  not 
directed  to  an  elucidation  of  that  mystery  at 
all.  It  is  not  the  design  of  God  to  offer  a 
vindication  of  His  dealings  with  men  in  gen^ 
eral,  or  a  justification  of  His  providence  to- 
wards Job.  He  has  no  intention  of  placing 
Himself  at  the  bar  of  His  creatures,  and 
erecting  them  into  judges  of  His  conduct. 
He  is  not  amenable  to  them,  and  He  does 
not  recognize  their  right  to  be  censors  of 
Him  and  of  His  ways.  The  righteousness 
of  His  providence  does  not  depend  upon 
their  perceiving  or  admitting  it.  The  Lord 
does   not  here  stand  on   the  defensive,  nor 


THE    LORD.  287 

allow  it  to  appear  as  though  He  were  in  any 
need  of  beins^  relieved  from  the  strictures  of 
Job,  or  it  were  of  any  account  to  Him  whether 
feeble  worms  approved  His  dealings  or  con- 
fessed the  propriety  of  His  dispensations. 
He  puts  Himself  in  a  totally  different  atti- 
tude, and  moves  upon  quite  another  plane. 
He  is  the  sovereign  Lord  of  all,  account- 
able to  no  being  but  Himself.  He  does  not 
appear  to  vindicate  Himself,  but  to  rescue 
Job. 

Job  has  been  exposed  to  the  fierce  assaults 
of  Satan,  and  has  successfully  withstood 
them.  The  tempter  employed  all  his  power 
and  all  his  craft  to  bring  him  to  forsake  the 
service  of  the  Lord ;  but  he  remained  firm  in 
his  steadfastness  nevertheless.  The  reality 
and  the  strength  of  Job's  piety  were  conspicu- 
ously established  from  the  moment  that  he 
uttered  his  memorable  declaration,  "  I  know 
that  my  Redeemer  liveth."  His  heroic  trust 
in  God  was  not  destroyed  by  the  direst  ca- 
lamities, nor  even  by  the  wrathful  frowns 
that  seemed  to  darken   His  face.     Job  was 

13 


288  THE    LORD. 

fully    vindicated    against    Satan's     baseless 
slander. 

But  the  affair  was  not  to  be  terminated 
there.  It  was  not  the  divine  purpose  that 
the  trial  should  end  with  this  merely  nega- 
tive result.  Nor  was  it  enough  that  he 
should  simply  receive  the  profit,  which  had 
already  arisen  to  him  from  the  struggle 
through  which  he  had  been  obliged  to  pass. 
His  constancy  and  faith  have  been  height- 
ened. He  has  grown  in  spiritual  heroism 
and  power.  He  has  risen  to  clearer  and 
broader  views  than  he  possessed  before. 
And  practice  has  taught  him  skill :  he  has 
learned  how  to  overcome  temptation  by 
actual  experience.  But  even  this  w^as  not 
all.  The  Lord  had  still  larger  designs  of 
good  in  store  for  His  faithful  servant.  The 
true  vindication  of  God's  providence  lies  in 
the  event.  It  must  not  be  judged  by  the 
confused  and  tangled  threads  which  it  seems 
to  present  to  the  beholder  while  in  the  pro- 
cess of  being  wrought,  but  by  the  completed 
pattern  when  all  shall  be  finished.     The  Lord 


THE    LORD.  289 

has  been  In  no  haste  to  justify  Himself  by  a 
premature  disclosure  of  His  plans.  He  has 
suffered  things  to  move  regularly  forward 
and  to  take  their  appointed  course.  But 
now  the  time  has  arrived  for  His  own  inter- 
vention to  bring  the  matter  to  its  intended 
termination. 

Satan  had  been  allowed  to  bring  a  double 
evil  upon  Job,  in  his  outward  circumstances, 
and  in  his  spiritual  state.  He  had  inflicted 
severe  external  losses  and  sufferings,  and  he 
had  involved  him  in  a  sore  inward  conflict. 
Job  had  fought  this  latter  through  victori- 
ously, so  far  as  it  was  possible  for  him  to 
do  from  his  previous  standpoint  in  religious 
knowledge  and  in  the  religious  life.  He 
had  risen  to  the  sublime  assurance  that  God 
was  his  Redeemer  and  friend,  and  would  be, 
let  come  what  w^ould.  No  floods  of  temptation 
could  destroy  this  conviction,  no  fierceness  of 
Satan's  assault  could  wrest  it  from -him.  Still 
the  cloud  and  the  mystery  remained.  A  dis- 
turbing: element  had  been  introduced  into 
the   patriarch's   inward   experience,  to  which 


290  THE    LORD. 

he  could  indeed  so  far  bid  defiance  as  to 
hold  fast  to  his  faith  in  God  in  spite  of  it, 
but  which  was  nevertheless  productive  of  dis- 
quiet and  distress.  He  could  not  attain  to 
that  placid,  unruffled  state  of  calm  repose 
which  marked  his  condition  before  his  trials 
came.  There  had  been  a  jar  in  his  relations 
to  his  Maker,  which,  though  it  could  not 
throw  him  off  his  firm  foundation,  had  yet 
marred  his  tranquillity  and  peace.  But  this 
disturbance  was  not  to  last  always. 

It  had  been  a  valuable  discipline  to  Job  in 
two  respects.  He  had  in  the  first  place,  as 
we  have  seen,  been  instructed  and  strength- 
ened by  the  intensity  of  the  struggle  which 
had  been  forced  upon  him.  And  he  had  in 
addition  been  prepared  to  receive  a  further 
spiritual  lesson.  He  had  been  made  sensi- 
ble of  a  need  which  he  did  not  previously  know 
to  exist,  —  a  need  of  instruction,  a  need  of 
succor,  which  craved  a  heavenly  gift  that  had 
before  been  unsought,  because  the  necessity 
which  required  it  had  not  been  felt.  He  was 
now  in  a  state  of  readiness  to  welcome  a  new 


THE    LORD.  291 

divine  communication ;  and  this  had  been 
brought  about  by  the  trials  through  which 
he  had  passed.  Satan  meant  to  have  sun- 
dered him  from  the  Lord :  he,  in  fact,  opened 
the  way  for  larger  and  fuller  impartations  of 
divine  knowledge  and  grace.  He  had  but 
prepared  the  way  of  the  Lord,  who  was  now 
to  come  to  Job  with  a  nearness  and  fulness 
of  manifestation  as  never  before. 

The  sore  discipline  of  Job  had  endured 
long  enough.  It  had  wrought  its  full  effect 
of  preparation  for  the  divine  intervention. 
The  Lord,  therefore,  appears  upon  the  scene 
without  further  delay,  to  perfect  the  blessing 
*  which,  as  He  has  all  along  intended,  was  to 
be  the  issue  of  his  severe  but  salutary  trials. 
He  comes  to  rescue  him  from  the  double 
distress  in  which  Satan  has  plunged  him,  and 
to  bestow  upon  him  a  corresponding  twofold 
benefit,  —  first,  inward  and  spiritual ;  secondly, 
outward  and  temporal. 

The  Lord  first  produces  an  effect  upon  the 
heart  of  Job.  He  makes  such  a  manifestation 
of  Himself  to  the  sufferer's  soul  as  brings  him 


292  THE    LORD. 

to  the  deepest  humiliation  and  contrition  for 
all  his  rash  and  impatient  utterances,  and  all 
the  improper  reflections  he  had  cast  upon  God's 
dealings  with  him  in  His  providence.     He  had 
before  found  peace  with  his  Maker,  so  far  as 
his  personal  relation  to   God  was  concerned. 
But  now  he  is  entirely  acquiescent  in  all  the 
Lord's  dealings;  he  repents  of  his  murmur- 
ings ;  he  surrenders  his  wayward  resistance  to 
the  divine   orderings;    his  will    is  henceforth 
coincident  with  the  divine  will,  and  completely 
swallowed  up  in  it.     And   he  is   amazed   at 
himself   and    filled   with   self-abhorrence    that 
it  ever  could  have  been  otherwise  with  him. 
Thereupon  the  Lord  in  addition  restores  Job's 
outward  estate,  and  raises  it  to  a  higher  meas- 
ure of  prosperity   than   he   possessed   before. 
The  whole  matter  is  thus  brought  to  its  final 
issue:   Job's  piety  is  elevated,  and  his  welfare 
and  happiness  are  promoted.      The  latter  is 
recorded   in    the    historical    paragraph   which 
concludes  the  book,  the  last  eleven  verses  of 
the  final  chapter.     The  former  is  accomplished 
by  the  Lord's  discourse,  which  does  not  do  its 


THE    LORD.  293 

work,  however,  by  means  of  arguments  ad- 
dressed to  the  solution  of  the  enigma  that  has 
occupied  the  minds  of  Job  and  of  his  friends. 
This  discourse  contains  a  solution  only  in  so 
far  as  it  is  effective  in  bringing  about  that 
result,  which  is  itself  the  explanation  of  this 
mysterious  providence. 

The  purport  of  the  Lord's  discourse  in  its 
relation  to  Job  and  to  the  problem  of  the  af- 
flictions of  the  righteous  has  been  variously 
misconceived  and  misstated.  As  it  is  chiefly 
occupied  with  appeals  to  the  works  of  God  in 
nature,  which  display  in  such  a  striking  manner 
the  omnipotence  of  the  Most  High  in  its  con- 
trast with  the  impotence  of  man,  it  has  been 
thought  that  the  main  idea,  reiterated  in  various 
forms  and  enforced  throughout  this  address,  is 
the  infinite  exaltation  and  power  of  God.  His 
sway  is  irresistible.  It  is  vain  to  think  of  op- 
posing omnipotence.  And  the  lesson  thence 
deduced  is  supposed  to  be  that  of  unconditional 
resignation  to  the  will  of  the  Infinite  Sover- 
eign. Since  God  is  almighty.  His  orderings 
must  be  submitted  to.    The  creature  must  yield 


294  THE    LORD. 

unresistingly  to  what  the  Creator  decrees.  It 
is  worse  than  useless  to  repine  or  murmur: 
man  must  bow  with  meek  submission  to  any 
allotment,  be  it  what  it  may,  coming  from  such 
a  source. 

But  submission  to  the  inevitable  is  stoicism, 
or  fatalism,  not  Scriptural  resignation.  We  have 
to  do  not  with  overwhelming  force,  but  with 
our  heavenly  Father,  who  demands  our  love  as 
well  as  our  willing  obedience ;  and  to  whom  we 
should  submit,  not  by  constraint,  but  with  a 
ready  mind.  We  may  be  compelled  to  yield 
subjection  to  irresistible  power,  but  it  will  not 
satisfy  the  reason  nor  the  sense  of  right.  It 
was  this,  in  fact,  which  lent  its  chief  aggrava- 
tion to  the  temptation  of  Job;  this  was  the 
very  point  about  which  it  all  centred.  His 
unaccountable  sufferings,  the  baseless  reason- 
ings of  his  friends,  and  every  thing  in  his 
whole  situation,  conspired  to  set  the  Lord 
before  him  in  the  aspect  of  a  Being  of  absolute 
and  arbitrary  power,  who  was  using  His  om- 
nipotence to  torture  and  destroy  him  without 
any  ground  in  reason  or  any  relentings  of  pity.' 


THE    LORD.  295 

An  almighty  tyrant  on  the  throne  of  the 
universe  would  inspire  terror,  but  could  not 
awaken  confidence  or  love.  He  might  break 
down  all  open  opposition  and  stamp  out  the 
very  semblance  of  it,  but  He  could  not  compel 
the  adoration  of  the  heart.  Job,  prostrate  and 
bleeding,  protested  with  what  he  supposed  to 
be  his  dying  breath  against  the  cruel  wrong 
which  was  done  him.  Violence,  from  which 
there  is  no  escape  and  against  which  there  is 
no  remedy,  is  only  the  more  dreaded  and  de- 
tested on  that  account.  God  is  more  than 
almighty  power,  or  Job  would  not  have  hum- 
bled himself  before  Him  as  he  did  in  cordial 
homage  and  submissive  self-abasement.  He 
fell  prostrate  before  an  inward  constraint  which 
was  very  different  from  outward  compulsion. 

Again  it  has  been  supposed  that  the  bur- 
den of  the  Lord's  discourse  is  God's  infinite 
wisdom  as  displayed  in  His  works,  which  so 
far  transcends  our  faculties,  baffling  the  most 
adventurous  efforts  of  the  human  under- 
standing. These  appeals  to  the  incomprehen- 
sible marvels  which  everywhere  abound  in  the 

13* 


296  THE    LORD. 

world  are  intended,  it  is  said,  to  suggest  the 
existence  of  marvels  equally  incomprehen- 
sible in  God's  providence.  There  is  a  mys- 
tery in  all  His  ways,  in  nature,  and  in  the 
affairs  of  men,  w^hich  no  human  intelligence 
is  able  to  penetrate.  It  must  be  accepted  as 
a  product  of  the  infinite  reason  without  in- 
sisting upon  knowing  how  or  why.  It  is  not 
given  to  man  to  fathom  what  it  belongs  only 
to  the  divine  understanding  to  comprehend. 
The  ways  of  God  are  inscrutable.  Man 
should  adore  where  he  cannot  understand, 
and  submit  without  questioning  to  allotments, 
which  it  w^ould  be  arrogant  to  suppose  could 
be  made  level  to  his  feeble  comprehension. 

There  is  a  partial  truth  in  this  view  as  in 
the  preceding.  God  is  infinitely  wise  and 
infinitely  powerful ;  and  both  of  these  attri- 
butes of  the  divine  nature  supply  considera- 
tions which  enter  into  and  enforce  pious 
resignation.  But  the  lesson  of  the  book  of 
Job  in  these  its  most  solemn  utterances  from 
the  mouth  of  God  Himself  is  something  more 
than    that    there    is    nothing  we  can  know ; 


THE    LORD.  297 

that  the  mystery  of  the  sufferings  of  good 
men  must  remain  unexplained,  for  no  ex- 
planation is  possible.  This  would  not  be  to 
set  at  rest  troubled  questionings  and  anxious 
inquiries  into  the  principles  of  the  divine  ad- 
ministration, and  its  consistency  with  God's  in- 
effable perfections.  It  would  rather  tend  to 
repel  all  inquiry  as  profitless  and  leading  to 
no  certain  or  safe  result,  even  if  it  is  not  posi- 
tively profane,  and  a  pernicious  treading  on 
forbidden  ground,  and  prying  into  what  it 
is  not  allowable  to  know.  Instead,  then,  of 
shedding  any  light  upon  this  mysterious  sub- 
ject, the  only  teacliing  of  this  book  would  be 
that  we  must  remain  content  with  a  darkness 
that  can  never,  from  the  nature  of  the  case, 
be  dispelled.  Instead  of  adding  to  our 
knowledge  it  would  declare  that  further 
knowledge  was   unattainable. 

And,  if  this  were  the  case,  why  should  the 
Lord  have  revealed  Himself  to  Job  at  all  in 
so  august  a  manner.^  In  what  respect  was 
he  helped  or  instructed  by  the  manifestation 
of  God  to  him,  if  it  had  no  other  intent  than 


-^ 


298  THE    LORD. 

that  just  stated  ?  If  the  discourse  of  the 
Lord,  with  all  its  rare  sublimity,  does  not 
carry  him  beyond  the  point  which  he  had 
already  reached  himself,  what  was  the  need 
of  any  immediate  divine  intervention  ?  Job 
was  profoundly  sensible  of  the  mystery  of 
God's  providence.  And  he  had  confessed  it 
to  be  quite  impenetrable.  The  wisdom  that 
could  fathom  it,  he  had  said,  was  "  hid  from 
the  eyes  of  all  living,"  and  was  possessed  by 
God  alone ;  and  the  highest  wisdom  to  which 
man  could  attain  was  the  fear  of  the  Lord 
(xxviii.  20-28).  Job  had  learned  to  adhere  to 
his  pious  fear  of  God,  though  he  could  not 
comprehend  His  ways  ;  to  avouch  the  Lord 
to  be  his  Redeemer,  though  His  providence 
remained  an  incomprehensible  mystery.  The 
lesson  of  the  Lord's  discourse  must  be  some- 
thing beyond  what  Job  had  himself  already 
attained  to. 

There  are  two  things  which  may  supply 
the  key  to  what  this  lesson  really  is  :  the  first 
is  the  preliminaiy  speech  of  Elihu,  by  which 
that  of   the   Lord  is  immediately  preceded; 


THE    LORD.  299 

and  the  second,  the  effect  which  the  lattei 
produces  upon  Job.  The  Lord's  discourse  is 
not  to  be  sundered  from  that  of  EHhu,  which 
was  the  preparation  for  it,  which  was  followed 
by  it  without  any  pause  and  thus  as  it  were 
merged  in  it,  and  which  was  taken  for  granted 
by  it.  EHhu  was  sent  with  the  theoretical,  as 
the  Lord  supplies  the  practical,  solution  of  this 
great  problem.  He  was  commissioned  to  make 
the  needed  explanations  to  Job,  to  rectify  his 
mistakes  and  point  out  to  him  wherein  he  had 
erred.  ♦  His  task  was  to  disabuse  his  mind  of 
every  false  impression  and  prepare  him  for 
the  coming  of  the  Lord,  so  that  upon  His  ap- 
pearance he  might  instantly  recognize  Him  in 
His  true  character,  and  feel  toward  Him  as 
he  should.  To  Job's  mind  his  sufferings  had 
been  hostile  treatment  on  the  part  of  God. 
He  could  look  upon  them  in  no  other  light 
than  as  tokens  of  the  divine  displeasure.  God 
was  dealing  with  him  in  ano^er.  He  was  in- 
deed  able  notwithstanding  to  afHrm  that  God 
was  his  Redeemer.  In  spite  of  His  present 
hostility,  which  was  so  unaccountable  and  so 


300  ,       THE    LORD. 

distressing,  Job  had  gained  the  confident  as- 
surance that  God  would  yet  at  some  future 
time  lay  aside  these  strangely  mysterious  frowns, 
and  manifest  Himself  on  his  behalf.  But 
Elihu  opens  up  to  him  a  new  view  of  the  case. 
He  shows  him  that  this  imagined  hostility  is 
not  really  such.  His  afflictions  are  not  the 
fruit  of  God's  anger,  but  of  His  kindness  and 
love.  God  has  not  been  dealing  hardly  and 
cruelly  with  him,  but  has  been  accomplishing 
the  purposes  of  His  grace  on  his  behalf  by 
methods  which,  however  severe,  are  salutary. 

This  alters  the  whole  aspect  of  the  mat- 
ter. What  had  been  dark  before  is  dark  no 
lono^er.  The  face  of  God  seems  no  more  to 
wear  a  forbidding  aspect  even  for  a  season. 
What  he  had  thought  to  be  the  terrible  seiz- 
ure of  a  mortal  foe  is  the  powerful  grasp  of 
a  friend.  What  he  had  imagined  to  be  the 
deadly  thrust  of  hostile  weapons  proves  to 
be  the  skilful  incision  of  the  great  Physician 
who  wounds  but  to  heal.  His  repinings  and 
murmurings  and  bitter  complaints  have  no 
longer  any  foundation.     The  chief  source  of 


THE    LORD.  301 

his  agitation  and  distress  is  gone.  The 
seeming  contradiction  has  vanished  between 
the  actual  and  the  ideal,  between  what  he 
experienced  and  what  he  might  have  ex- 
pected, between  the  God  of  the  present  and 
of  the  future,  between  the  God  who  afflicts 
and  the  God  who  saves.  God  is  his  re- 
deemer, not  merely  out  of  existing  sorrows 
or  in  spite  of  them,  but  in  them  and  through 
them  and  by  means  of  them.  Faith  is  no 
lono^er  reduced  to  such  straits  that  it  can 
barely  maintain  itself  by  looking  away  from 
the  present  and  holding  fast  to  the  unseen 
future.  It  has  a  visible  and  tangible  basis  in 
the  present  itself.  In  these  very  trials  which 
had  threatened  to  sweep  away  his  trust  in 
God,  that  trust  now  finds  a  new  and  firm 
support ;  for  he  discerns  in  them  the  clear 
'tokens  of  heavenly  love. 

The  cloud  has  disappeared  which  for  a 
time  had  hidden  the  bright  shining  of  his 
Father's  face.  And  now  when  God  mani- 
fests Himself  to  Job,  there  is  nothing  to 
obscure   his   sense   of    the   divine   favor  and 


302  THE    LORD. 

loving-kindness.  The  distorted  image  of 
God  has  passed  away  completely  and  for- 
ever. Ineffable  love  is  restored  to  its  true 
place  among  the  perfections  of  the  Most 
High.  His  might  and  greatness  do  not 
stand  alone.  He  who  is  infinite  in  these 
is  infinite  likewise  in  His  compassions.  It 
is  sufficient  to  point  out  any  indication  of 
the  Lord's  presence  or  of  the  grandeur  of 
His  being,  to  bring  all  the  divine  attributes 
full-orbed  before  the  mind  of  Job.  He  sees 
the  Lord  no  longer  through  a  false  medium, 
which  shuts  out  half  the  glory  of  His  nature, 
but  as  He  truly  is. 

The  same  thing  appears  from  the  effect 
which  the  Lord's  discourse  produces  upon 
Job.  It  gives  him  a  new  and  more  distinct 
apprehension  of  God,  a  more  vivid  and  pow- 
erful impression  of  His  glorious  nature.  It 
was  not  the  perception  of  one  attribute  iso- 
lated from  the  rest,  or  exalted  above  the  rest, 
which  led  him  to  exclaim,  "  I  have  heard  of 
Thee  by  the  hearing  of  the  ear:  but  now 
mine  eye  seeth  Thee  "  (xlii.  5).     All  his  pre- 


THE    LORD.  303 

vious  conceptions  of  God  were  faint  and  dis- 
tant compared  with  the  intimate  and  thorough 
conviction  of  His  exalted  being  which  now 
possessed  his  soul.  It  was  as  that  which 
is  learned  by  distant  report  compared  with 
that  which  stands  revealed  with  the  clearness 
and  evidence  of  eyesight.  This  points  to  no 
partial,  imperfect,  one-sided  view  of  God,  in 
which  certain  attributes  are  made  prominent 
at  the  expense  of  others,  and  some  are  hid- 
den altogether,  but  to  a  complete  and  true 
perception  of  God  in  His  real  character.  His 
impatient  utterances  under  the  pressure  of 
his  afflictions  were  due  to  a  defective  appre- 
hension of  the  glorious  character  of  God. 
Now  that  he  sees  God  as  He  truly  is,  he  is 
abashed  and  confounded  that  he  ever  could 
have  spoken  as  he  did  or  indulged  such  feel- 
ings as  he  then  had. 

The  Lord's  discourse  was  spoken  with  the 
aim  of  producing  this  effect  upon  Job,  and 
bringing  him  to  this  humbled  and  repentant 
state  of  mind.  The  important  fact,  and  that 
which  is  really  influential  in  the  case,  is  that 


304  THE    LORD. 

God  now  manifests  Himself  to  the  soul  of 
Job ;  and  this  discourse  is  simply  an  accom- 
paniment or  a  medium  of  this  manifestation. 
It  opens  up  to  Job  and  brings  home  to  him 
in  the  most  impressive  manner  the  greatness 
and  the  perfection  of  that  Being  with  whom 
he  has  to  do.  The  whole  address  is  but  the 
unfolding  of  the  thought,  I  am  the  infinite, 
and  all-perfect  God.  And  this  truth  is  set 
before  his  mind  by  a  series  of  appeals  to  the 
grandeur  of  God's  works,  by  which  His  per- 
fections are  so  strikingly  displayed  in  con- 
trast with  the  utter  insignificance  of '  man. 
Job  is  made  to  feel  at  once  who  it  is  that  is 
speaking  to  him ;  and  how  completely  he 
had  stepped  out  of  his  province,  and  of  what 
incredible  arrogance  and  presumption  he  had 
been  guilty  in  venturing  to  pass  his  judgment 
upon  the  doings  of  the  Most  High. 

"  Then  the  Lord  answered  Job  out  of  the 
whirlwind."  The  clouds,  to  which  Elihu  had- 
pointed  as  covering  the  light,  had  grown 
darker  and  more  threatening,  until  they  over- 
spread the  sky.     The  lightning,  the  thunder, 


THE    LORD.  305 

and  the  tempest,  in  which  the  Lord  had 
veiled  His  awful  majesty,  had  been  steadily 
approaching,  and  filled  all  hearts  with  solemn 
dread.  And  now  from  the  bosom  of  the 
rushing  storm  comes  forth  a  voice,  the  voice 
of  Jehovah,  in  unapproachable  sublimity, 
speaking  unto  Job:  "Who  is  this  that  dark- 
eneth  counsel  by  words  without  knowledge  ?  " 
Who  and  what  is  he  who  has  been  daring 
to  obscure  the  wise  orderings  of  my  gracious 
and  holy  providence  by  the  ignorant  and 
empty  reflections  he  has  cast  upon  them  ? 
What  is  his  ability,  and  what  his  claims  to 
act  as  the  censor  of  the  divine  proceedings  ? 
"  Gird  up  now  thy  loins  like  a  man ;  for 
I  will  demand  of  thee,  and  answer  thou 
me.  Where  wast  thou  when  I  laid  the 
foundations  of  the  earth  ?  declare,  if  thou 
hast  understanding.  Who  hath  laid  the 
measures  thereof,  if  thou  knowest  ?  or 
who  hath  stretched  the  line  upon  it.^ 
Whereupon  are  the  foundations  thereof 
fastened  ?  or  who  laid  the  corner-stone 
thereof:   when  the  morning  stars    sang  to- 


306  THE    LORD. 

gether  and  all  the  sons  of  God  shouted  for 
joy  ?  Or  who  shut  up  the  sea  with  doors, 
when  it  brake  forth,  as  if  it  had  issued  out 
of  the  womb  ?  When  I  made  the  cloud  the 
garment  thereof,  and  thick  darkness  a  swad- 
dling band  for  it,  and  brake  up  for  it  my  de- 
creed place,  and  set  bars  and  doors,  and  said, 
Hitherto  shalt  thou  come,  but  no  further: 
and  here  shall  thy  proud  waves  be  stayed. 
Hast  thou  commanded  the  morning  since 
thy  days ;  and  caused  the  day-spring  to  know 
his  place  ? "  The  Lord  further  continues 
His  appeal  to  the  marvels  of  the  sea,  of 
death  and  the  unseen  world,  of  light  and 
darkness,  of  the  snow  and  rain,  the  ice  and 
cold,  of  the  stars,  of  the  various  celestial 
changes  with  their  terrestrial  effects,  of  the 
soul  of  man,  of  the  instincts,  habits,  and 
adaptations  of  various  orders  of  the  animate 
creation ;  and  concludes  with  the  pointed 
interrogation  (xl.  2) :  "  Shall  he  that  contend- 
eth  with  the  Almighty  instruct  Him  ?  he 
that  reproveth  God,  let  him  answer  it." 

Awe-struck  and  abashed  at  his  own  little- 


THE    LORD.  307 

ness  and  at  the  absurd  pretensions  involved 
in  his  rash  and  inconsiderate  complaints, 
Job  answered  the  Lord,  and  said  :  "  Behold, 
I  am  vile ;  what  shall  I  answer  Thee  ?  I 
will  lay  my  hand  upon  my  mouth.  Once 
have  I  spoken;  but  I  will  not  answer:  yea, 
twice ;  but  I  will  proceed  no  further." 

The  Lord  then  speaks  once  more  to  Job 
with  the  view  of  deepening  the  impression 
already  made,  and  of  showing  still  further 
of  what  vain  conceit  of  his  own  powers  Job 
had  been  guilty,  and  what  unheard-of  as- 
sumptions were  involved  in  the  language  he 
had  suffered  himself  to  use.  Was  he  pre- 
pared to  assume  the  government  of  the  world, 
and  to  take  it  out  of  the  hands  of  the  Most 
High,  whose  administration  he  had  ventured 
to  arraign  ?  God  challenges  him  to  show  a 
power  or  execute  deeds  of  judgment  which 
would  warrant  these  bold  pretensions.  "  Wilt 
thou  also  disannul  my  judgment?  wilt  thou 
condemn  me,  that  thou  mayest  be  righteous  ? 
Hast  thou  an  arm  like  God  ?  or  canst  thou 
thunder  with  a  voice  like   Him?     Deck  thy- 


308  THE    LORD. 

self  now  with  majesty  and  excellency ;  and 
array  thyself  with  glory  and  beauty.  Cast 
abroad  the  rage  of  thy  wrath :  and  behold 
every  one  that  is  proud,  and  abase  him. 
Look  on  every  one  that  is  proud,  and  bring 
him  low ;  and  tread  down  the  wicked  in  their 
place.  Hide  them  in  the  dust  together ;  and 
bind  their  faces  in  secret.  Then  will  I  also 
confess  unto  thee  that  thine  own  right  hand 
can  save  thee."  So  far  indeed  is  he  from 
being  able  to  measure  himself  with  God  that 
he  cannot  even  cope  with  His  creatures, as  he 
is  reminded  by  a  reference  to  two  formidable 
animals,  behemoth  and  leviathan,  probably 
the  hippopotamus  and  crocodile. 

The  full  impression  intended  has  by  this 
time  been  made  on  Job,  and  he  falls  prostrate 
before  the  infinite  God  in  self-abasement  and 
self-reproach.  Convicted  of  his  fault,  he 
makes  instant  confession.  "  I  have  uttered 
that  I  understood  not ;  things  too  wonderful 
for  me,  which  I  knew  not.  I  have  heard  of 
Thee  by  the  hearing  of  the  ear :  but  now 
mine  eye  seeth  Thee.  Wherefore  I  abhor 
myself,  and  repent  in  dust  and  ashes." 


THE    LORD.  309 

Job  has  now  reached  an  elevation  far 
above  his  former  self.  The  depth  of  his 
humiliation  is  really  the  summit  of  his  ex- 
altation in  piety,  and  in  the  fear  and  love  of 
God.  That  he  now  looks  down  upon  him- 
self as  he  does,  shows  how  he  has  been  raised 
above  what  he  was  before.  He  has  made  a 
great  advance  beyond  the  fervor  of  that  mo- 
ment when,  in  the  darkest  period  of  his 
struggle,  his  faith  looked  out  with  more  than 
eagle  glance  into  the  unseen,  and  by  one 
mighty  effort  rose  superior  to  every  tempta- 
tion based  upon  the  visible  and  the  temporal, 
affirming  God  to  be  his  redeemer  in  the  face 
of  every  thing  outward  which  seemed  to  for- 
bid  all  hope.  The  faith,  to  which  he  has  now 
attained,  would  not  only  have  gained  the 
mastery  in  this  frightful  contest,  but  would 
have  trampled  Satan's  temptation  under  foot 
without  a  conflict. 

The  faith,  which  shone  out  so  conspicu- 
ously in  that  triumphant  exclamation,  was 
nevertheless  defective,  or  the  struggle  would 
not  have  been  so  fierce,  nor  the  triumph  so 


3IO  THE    LORD. 

hard  to  gain.  He  trusted  in  God,  who  was 
afflicting  him,  so  far  as  steadfastly  to  beHeve 
and  to  declare  that  God  would  certainly  here- 
after, in  the  world  to  come,  if  not  in  this,  lay 
aside  His  seeming  hostility  and  reveal  Him- 
self as  his  friend.  He  trusted  in  God  in 
spite  of  these  afflictions,  confident  that  He 
would  deliver  him  out  of  them  and  would 
then  be  his  God.  But  his  trust  in  God  was 
not  such  as  to  persuade  him  that  in  afflicting 
him  He  was  still  acting  as  his  gracious  God 
and  redeemer.  He  was  so  far  under  the 
dominion  of  sense  that  there  was  still  a 
region  which  faith  had  not  completely  sub- 
dued unto  itself.  The  opposition  between 
God's  present  treatment  of  him  and  His  lov- 
ing regard  for  him  still  remained  to  his  mind, 
and  he  had  not  that  implicit  trust  in  God 
w^hich  could  do  it  away.  He  had  a  faith 
which  could  resolutely  turn  its  back  upon 
the  mountain  of  difficulty,  but  not  one  which 
could  say  to  it.  Be  thou  removed,  and  be  thou 
cast  into  the  depths  of  the  sea,  and  sunk  out 
of  sight  or  dissolved  away  beneath  the  ocean 


THE    LORD.  311 

of  divine  love.  There  still  was  to  him  an 
apparent  contradiction  here,  which  his  faith 
could  disregard,  but  could  not  annul ;  a  pres- 
ent breach  between  him  and  God,  which  his 
faith  could  bridge  over,  but  could  not  close 
up. 

Now,  however,  he  has  learned  to  exercise 
a  more  perfect  trust  in  God.  He  now  con- 
fides in  Him  more  thoroughly  than  before. 
He  can  now  trust  God  in  every  thing,  and 
believe  that  He  doeth  all  things  well.  He 
has  gained  such  a  view  of  God  and  of  the 
perfections  of  His  being,  that  he  now  be- 
lieves that  the  Most  High  cannot  do  any 
thing  that  is  out  of  harmony  with  His  per- 
fections. All  that  He  does  must  be  right 
and  wise  and  good.  Job's  faith  may  not 
enable  him  to  fathom  the  mysteries  of  God, 
nor  to  solve  the  riddles  of  His  providence. 
He  may  not  comprehend  how  these  things 
are.  But  he  knows  that  God  is  all-perfect 
and  all-glorious,  and  he  has  that  confidence 
in  Him  which  assures  him  that  these  things 
must  be  so.     If  He  has  sent  afiliction,  this  is 

14 


312  THE    LORD. 

not  even  a  temporaiy  interruption  of  His 
favor  and  love,  though  these  are  sure  to 
shine  forth  again  hereafter  clear  and  full. 
Nor  is  it  enough  to  say  that  affliction  is 
capable  of  being  reconciled  with  the  divine 
love.  It  is  itself  a  fruit  of  that  love.  God  is 
equally  loving  and  gracious  when  He  sends 
affliction  and  when  He  sends  prosperous 
abundance. 

Job's  afflictions  have  not  abated  yet.  His 
terrible  losses  are  still  as  great  as  they  were, 
and  his  bodily  sufferings  are  as  grievous. 
But  the  cloud  is  gone.  He  has  lost  all  dis- 
position to  murmur  or  repine.  He  is  amazed 
at  himself  that  he  could  ever  have  done  so. 
Since  the  Lord  has  disclosed  Himself  to  him, 
such  a  sense  of  the  perfections  of  Him,  who 
is  blessed  for  ever,  has  filled  his  soul  as 
forms  the  basis  of  an  absolutely  unlimited 
confidence.  He  can  trust  the  infinitely  holy 
and  mighty  and  wise  and  gracious  One  to 
do  whatsoever  seemeth  Him  good.  It  is 
good  if  God  does  it ;  it  is  the  best  thing 
possible ;    no   man    at    least,  nor    any   finite 


THE    LORD.  313 

being,  could  alter  it  for  the  better ;  and  Job 
would  not  have  it  otherwise.  The  tempta- 
tion .  is  not  vanquished  now :  it  has  disap- 
peared. It  is  not  overcome  by  a  tremendous 
effort ;  but  the  huge  mountain  has  sunk  to  a 
level  plain.  Though  the  sea  roared  before 
and  was  troubled,  he  went  through  the  midst 
of  its  waves  unharmed  and  dry-shod;  but 
now  his  faith  has  gained  in  strength,  until  it 
has  been  able  to  bid  the  sea  become  dry  land; 
and  the  billows  have  ceased  their  tempestu- 
ous roll,  and  there  is  no  more  sea. 

Job  has  now  come  to  the  end  of  the  third, 
which  is  the  last  and  most  fearful  stage  of 
the  temptation.  The  struggle  has  been  tre- 
mendous. It  has  been  a  long  and  a  weari- 
some and  a  desperately  contested  conflict. 
But  the  issue  is  glorious.  The  forces  of  the 
enemy  are  not  merely  driven  back,  and  left  to 
rally  and  return  again  to  the  charge.  They 
are  not  merely  routed  and  put  to  an  igno- 
minious and  disordered  flight.  -They  are 
positively  annihilated,  and  the  victory  is 
complete   and   final.     Sublime   as  was   Job's 


314  THE    LORD. 

resignation  in  the  first  and  second  stage  of 
his  afflictions,  it  is  sublimer  now.  When  his 
property  and  his  children  were  all  swept 
from  him  at  a  stroke,  Job  still  blessed  the 
name  of  the  Lord,  mindful  of  the  fact  that 
the  Lord  had  given  what  He  now  took  away. 
When  in  addition  his  own  person  was  vis- 
ited with  a  dreadful  and  incurable  malady, 
he  meekly  received  the  evil  at  the  hands  of 
the  Lord,  mindful  of  the  good  which  He  had 
previously  bestowed.  His  constant  trust  in 
God  rooted  itself  each  time  in  the  past,  in 
the  abundance  of  former  mercies,  his  grateful 
sense  of  which  was  not  effaced  by  all  the 
severity  of  his  present  trials.  He  put  his 
trials  in  the  scales  over  against  the  benefits 
which  the  Lord  had  so  bounteously  conferred 
upon  him,  and  the  latter  still  largely  out- 
weighed. 

Nevertheless  each  infliction  of  evil  was 
an  opposing  weight,  acting  with  whatever 
force  it  possessed  in  a  contrary  direction 
from  God's  mercies,  and  to  that  extent  de- 
tracting from  his  sense   of   the  divine  good- 


THE    LORD.  315 

ness  and  love.  This  laid  him  open  to  the 
temptation  of  Satan.  And  it  created  the 
possibility  that  if  weight  enough  could  be 
accumulated  on  the  side  of  affliction,  acting 
as  it  did  with  the  advantage  which  the  imme- 
diate present,  ever  thrusting  itself  on  the  con- 
sciousness, has  over  the  dim  and  fading  sense 
of  the  more  and  more  distant  past,  it  might 
at  length  create  an  equipoise,  and  finally 
turn  the  scales  the  other  way.  And  if  this 
takes  place,  Job  has  fallen,  and  Satan  has 
gained  the  victory.  During  the  most  ter- 
rible period  of  his  sorrows,  when  Satan 
seemed  to  have  summoned  every  influence 
possible  to  depress  the  scale.  Job  was  indeed 
hard  pressed  by  his  wily  and  unscrupulous 
foe,  and  was  put  to  the  greatest  straits.  It 
was  as  much  as  he  could  do,  by  straining  his 
strength  to  the  utmost,  to  maintain  the  bal- 
ance on  the  right  side.  It  was  only  by  the 
strenuous  efforts  of  a  faith  that  took  hold  of 
the  unseen,  brought  to  its  aid  the  world  of 
the  future,  and  laid  its  grasp  upon  the  immu- 
table attributes  of  God  Himself,  thus  pinning 


31 6  THE    LORD. 

the  scale  down  to  the  everlasting  rock,  that 
he  could  keep  the  balance  on  the  side  of 
God  and  piety  against  a  pressure  too  great 
for  nature  to  sustain. 

And  thus  there  was,  to  this  extent,  some 
foundation  for  Satan's  malignant  sneer,  Doth 
Job  fear  God  for  nought  ?  The  enemy  had 
detected  a  crevice  in  the  structure  of  Job's 
faith,  into  which  he  hoped  to  drive  a  wedge 
that  should  rive  the  edifice  asunder  and  bring 
it  down  crumbling  into  ruins.  Job's  sense 
"■^  of  God's  goodness  rested  on  the  benefits  re- 
ceived from  Him,  instead  of  the  divine  good- 
ness being  itself  the  fixed  foundation,  and 
every  thing  received  from  the  hand  of  God 
being  for  that  reason  counted  a  benefit.  He 
judged  of  God  by  his  own  partial  and  defec- 
tive notion  of  His  dealings,  instead  of  judging 
of  those  dealings  by  his  knowledge  of  God. 
Job  had,  in  the  fierce  conflict  which  Satan 
had  waged  against  him,  been  driven  by  sheer 
necessity  to  base  his  faith  on  the  immovable 
foundation,  notwithstanding  the  darkness  and 
confusion  of  mind  which  still  rested  upon  the 


THE    LORD.  317 

mysterious  subject  of  his  sufferings.  But 
now  that  EHhu  had,  as  God's  messenger  of 
instruction,  pointed  out  to  him  the  gracious 
ends  of  affliction,  and  the  Lord  had  revealed 
Himself  to  him  in  the  true  glory  of  His 
nature,  the  previously  existing  flaw  in  Job's 
faith  is  closed  up.  The  perfections  of  God 
have  now  become  his  first  postulate,  self- 
evidenced,  and  independent  of  any  support  to 
be  derived  from  His  particular  dealings  with 
him. 

Heaven  and  earth  may  pass  away.  All 
things  seen  and  temporal  may  fluctuate  and 
change.  But  the  perfections  of  God  abide, 
incapable  of  mutation  or  decay.  This  is  the 
one  invariable,  fixed  point,  the  basis  of  all 
certainty,  and  of  all  correct  judgments.  It  is, 
in  mathematical  phrase,  the  origin  to  which 
every  thing  is  to  be  referred,  and  from  which 
every  thing  is  to  be  estimated.  God  must 
ever  act  like  Himself.  Whatever  He  does 
must  be  consistent  with  His  glorious  attri- 
butes, must  be  in  fact  the  outflow  of  those 
attributes.      The    orderino-s    of    Providence 


vv 


318  THE    LORD. 

have  their  spring  in  the  perfections  of  the 
ever-blessed  God.  Sense  cannot  discern  this. 
But  faith  affirms  it,  and  persistently  adheres 
to  it,  be  the  outward  appearance  of  things 
what  it  may. 

This  is  the  lesson  which  Job  has  now 
learned ;  and  hence  he  retracts  all  his  mur- 
muring words,  and  all  that  he  has  said  re- 
proachful to  his  Maker.  He  abhors  himself 
for  having  uttered  them,  and  repents  in  dust 
and  ashes.  He  would  not  now  ask  as  before, 
Shall  we  receive  good  at  the  hand  of  God, 
and  shall  we  not  receive  evil  ?  There  is  no 
evil,  there  can  be  no  evil  from  the  hand  of 
the  Lord.  Evil  is  good  when  it  comes  from 
Him.  He  no  longer  puts  the  benefits  received 
from  God  in  one  scale  and  afflictions  in  the 
other.  But  afflictions  are  put  in  the  same 
scale  with  benefits :  they,  too,  are  benefits 
when  God  sends  them.  And  thus,  instead 
of  tending  to  create  a  counter-poise,  they  but 
add  their  weight  to  that  of  obligation  pre- 
viously existing.  The  nerve  of  Satan's  temp- 
tation is  now  cut  completely.     Every  weight 


THE    LORD.  319 

goes  henceforth  into  the  scale  of  God's  good- 
ness, and  there  is  no  possibihty  of  disturbing 
the  existing  preponderance.  He  who  has 
learned  to  place  his  sole  and  undivided  trust 
in  God,  and  to  estimate  all  things  by  the  stand- 
ard of  His  perfection,  is  beyond  the  reach  of 
any  serious  attempt  to  detach  him  from  the 
Lord's  service.  To  such  a  faith  Job  has  risen 
under  the  felt  power  of  God's  immediate  pres- 
ence. He  is  now  in  a  perfectly  impregnable 
position,  and  Satan  can  assail  him  no  longer. 
His  spiritual  deliverance  is  complete. 

The  Lord's  purpose  in  permitting  these 
dreadful  sorrows  is  at  length  fully  accom- 
plished. There  is  no  further  occasion,  there- 
fore, for  their  continuance.  Accordingly  the 
Lord  now  interferes  for  their  removal.  And 
first  he  pronounces  in  Job's  favor  and  against 
his  friends.  "  The  Lord  said  to  Eliphaz  the 
Temanite,  My  wrath  is  kindled  against  thee, 
and  against  thy  two  friends :  for  ye  have  not 
spoken  of  me  the  thing  that  is  right,  as  my 
servant  Job  hath."  They  had  really  incul- 
pated the  providence  of  God  by  their  professed 

14* 


320  THE    LORD. 

defence  of  it.  By  disingenuously  covering 
up  and  ignoring  its  enigmas  and  seeming 
contradictions,  they  had  cast  more  discredit 
upon  it  than  Job  by  honestly  holding  them 
up  to  the  light.  Their  denial  of  its  apparent 
inequalities  was  more  untrue  and  more  dis- 
honoring to  the  divine  administration,  as  it  is 
in  fact  conducted,  than  Job's  bold  affirmation 
of  them.  Even  his  most  startling  utterances 
wrung  from  him  in  his  bewilderment  and  sore 
perplexity  were  less  reprehensible  than  their 
false  statements  and  false  inferences.  In  aver- 
ring that  God  was  treating  Job  as  a  gross 
offender,  they  indirectly  charge  Him  with 
injustice  and  cruelty  to  His  faithful  servant. 
Job's  impatient  outcries  under  his  sore  dis- 
tress were  less  offensive  to  God  than  these 
unwarrantable  misrepresentations.  And  now 
that  humbled  and  penitent  he  had  retracted 
all  that  he  had  rashly  spoken,  every  thing  was 
forgiven  and  forgotten  but  his  present  noble 
confession,  in  which,  stricken  as  he  was  in  the 
dust,  and  bleeding  at  every  pore,  he  had  yet 
placed  God  upon  the  throne,  and  submitted 
without  a  murmur  to   His  holy  will. 


THE    LORD.  321 

The  friends  of  Job,  who  had  thought  him 
an  outcast  from  the  divine  favor,  can  only  be 
restored  to  that  favor  themselves  through  the 
intercession  of  their  maligned  and  injured 
friend.  This  intercession  is  not  withheld, 
for  he  bears  no  malice  toward  them,  and  no 
resentment  for  all  their  ill-treatment.  The 
bitterness  that  had  sometimes  broken  out 
in  his  former  speeches  is  entirely  gone.  He 
forgives  them  as  God  had  forgiven  him.  And 
with  this  renewed  evidence  of  the  profit  which 
he  had  derived  from  his  afflictions,  his  cap- 
tivity is  turned  and  his  former  prosperity  is 
renewed  and  doubled. 

Job  is  now  entirely  extricated  from  Satan's 
snare,  and  released  from  his  burden  of  woe. 
And  the  riddle  is  at  length  solved.  The 
explanation  of  the  sufferings  of  God's  dear 
children,  as  suggested  by  the  case  of  Job, 
may  be  embraced  in  the  following  particulars. 
They  afford  to  all  gainsayers  a  palpable 
test  of  their  integrity.  The  very  intensity  of 
the  struggle  develops  their  faith  and  other 
graces,  and  leads  them  on  to  clearer  views  of 


322  THE    LORD. 

heavenly  truth.  These  sorrows  are  sent  on  the 
part  of  God  with  a  gracious  design,  and  af- 
ford the  occasion  of  His  reveahng  Himself  to 
chastened  souls  with  new  fulness  and  power, 
in  consequence  of  which  they  are  brought 
nearer  to  Him  than  ever  before,  and  their 
happiness  and  welfare  are  proportionally  pro- 
moted. 

"Behold,"  says  the  Apostle  James  (v.  ii) 
"  we  count  them  happy  which  endure.  Ye 
have  heard  of  the  patience  of  Job,  and  have 
seen  the  end  of  the  Lord  ;  that  the  Lord  is 
very  pitiful,  and  of  tender  mercy." 


CHAPTER   X. 


Blessed  are  they  that  mourn:  for  they  shall  be 
comforted.  —  Matt.  v.  4. 


THE   PLACE   OF   THE   BOOK  OF   JOB  IN 
THE  SCHEME  OF  HOLY  SCRIPTURE. 


Ty^T'E  have  now  made  our  way,  as  we  have 
been  able,  through  the  book  of  Job. 
We  have  traced  the  sore  temptation  which 
it  describes,  from  its  beginning  through  its 
successive  stages  until  its  ultimate  removal. 
We  have  seen  the  part  taken  by  each  of  the 
actors  in  this  spiritual  strife,  Satan,  Job's  wife, 
his  friends,  Elihu,  and  the  Lord.  We  have 
observed  Job's  own  demeanor  through  it  all. 
And  we  have  endeavored  to  read  the  lessons 
of  this  mysterious  dispensation,  as  they  are 
here  suggested.  Our  task  is  not  quite  fin- 
ished yet,  however.  If  we  would  estimate  this 
book  aright,  we  must  learn  not  only  what  it 
is,  but  to  what  it  leads.  Germs  of  truth  are 
exhibited  that  were  destined  to  be  expanded 


326      THE  PLACE  OF  THE  BOOK  OF  JOB  IN 

subsequently.  Lines  of  thought  are  started 
which,  consistently  followed  out,  conduct  to 
far-reaching  consequences.  The  sorrows  of 
the  man  of  Uz  stand  like  the  smitten  rock  of 
the  desert  at  the  head-waters  of  the  stream 
of  consolation.  This  precious  tide  flows  on 
with  ever-deepening  current,  gathering  fresh 
tributaries  as  it  flows,  and  bearing  more 
abundant  blessings  on  its  bosom,  until  it 
issues  in  the  boundless,  unfathomable  ocean 
of  divine  grace  and  love,  within  view  of  which 
we  are  brought  in  the  gospel. 

No  book  of  the  Bible  stands  apart  by 
itself,  or  can  be  fully  understood  if  it  is  only 
studied  separately  and  in  its  isolation.  It  is 
part  of  a  gradually  unfolded  revelation.  It 
belongs  to  a  well-ordered  system.  It  is  a  link 
in  a  chain.  It  is  a  member  of  an  organism. 
It  is  what  it  is,  not  for  itself  alone  ;  it  has 
been  shaped  with  reference  to  the  position 
that  it  is  to  occupy  and  the  function  it  has 
to  perform  in  the  plan  of  the  whole.  The 
history  of  Job  is  one  among  a  great  body 
of  signal  facts  illustrative  of  God's  ways  with 


THE  SCHEME  OF  HOLY  SCRIPTURE.         327 

men  and  of  His  plan  of  grace.  The  book  of 
Job  is  one  of  a  long  series  of  inspired  writings 
through  which  it  has  pleased  God  to  make 
known  His  will  and  to  reveal  Himself. 
What  precise  part  does  it  take  in  the  succes- 
sive disclosures  of  divine  truth  ?  How  does 
it  advance  upon  what  had  before  been  made* 
known  ?  How  does  it  prepare  for  what  was 
to  follow?  What  educating  power  lay  in  the 
truths  which  it  lodged  in  the  minds  and  hearts 
of  men,  and  of  what  further  consequences 
were  they  fruitful  ?  And  how  do  its  teach- 
ings stand  related  to  the  completed  revelation 
of  the  gospel  ? 

It  would  be  impossible  to  treat  such  a 
theme  as  this  exhaustively  within  the  narrow 
limits  to  which  we  must  confine  ourselves. 
And  the  attempt  to  do  so  under  any  circum- 
stances might  savor  of  arrogance  and  pre- 
sumption. It  will  be  sufficient  to  venture  a 
few  observations  by  way  of  suggestion. 

In  loo-ical  order  as  in  actual  fact  the  law 
precedes  the  gospel.  It  is  thus  in  the  experi- 
ence of  the  race  of  man  as  a  whole,  in  that  of 


328   THE  PLACE  OF  THE  BOOK  OF  JOB  IN 

the  chosen  people,  and  in  that  of  individual 
men.  The  covenant  of  works  goes  before  the 
covenant  of  grace ;  the  sentence  upon  our 
transgressing  first  parents  before  the  promise 
of  Him  who  should  bruise  the  serpent's  head ; 
the  commandment  given  by  Moses  before 
.grace  and  truth  by  Jesus  Christ ;  the  convic- 
tion of  sin  before  the  apprehension  of  saving 
mercy.  Unless  the  lesson  of  the  just  desert 
of  sin  and  of  the  inflexible  righteousness  of 
God  has  first  been  learned,  the  necessity  and 
value  of  the  offer  of  salvation  cannot  be 
understood.  The  doctrine  of  retribution  is  a 
necessary  prerequisite  to  that  of  delivering 
grace.  God  must  be  apprehended  as  a  Law- 
giver and  a  Judge  before  He  can  be  known 
as  a  Redeemer. 

In  a  general  sense  the  Old  Testament  may 
be  said  to  contain  the  law,  and  the  New 
Testament  the  gospel ;  and  they  are  accord- 
ingly contrasted  by  the  apostle  (2  Cor.  iii.  6), 
in  respect  to  their  tendencies  on  the  whole, 
as  the  letter  that  killeth  and  the  spirit  that 
giveth    life.        The    foundations    were    laid 


THE  SCHEME  OF  HOLY  SCRIPTURE.         329 

broad  and  deep,  and  strongly  cemented  by 
ages  of  the  continued  inculcation  of  God's 
essential  righteousness.  What  is  the  Old 
Testament  in  its  grand  divisions  but  the  Law 
proclaimed  at  Sinai,  confirmed  by  the  provi- 
dential retributions  of  the  History,  devoutly 
meditated  upon  and  practised  by  the  Psalm- 
ists and  other  inspired  poets,  and  expanded 
and  enforced  by  the  added  revelations  of  the 
Prophets?  When  the  law  had  thus  been 
wrought  by  all  these  concurrent  methods  into 
the  minds  and  hearts  and  lives  of  men,  then 
and  not  before  was  there  an  adequate  basis  on 
which  to  rear  a  superstructure  that  should 
match  it  in  amplitude  and  in  solidity,  the 
revelation  of  God's  immeasurable  grace. 

While,  however,  the  two  Testaments  are 
predominantly  what  has  now  been  described, 
they  are  not  exclusively  so.  The  statement, 
though  correct  in  the  main,  is  not  exhaustive. 
The  gospel  was  already  witnessed  by  the  law 
and  the  prophets  (Rom.  iii.  21) ;  and  the  faith 
of  Christ  re-enacts  and  establishes  the  law 
(Rom.  iii.  31).      Coupled  with  the  revelation 


330   THE  PLACE  OF  THE  BOOK  OF  JOB  IN 

of  God's  justice  under  the  Old  Testament 
there  was  a  co-ordinate  disclosure  of  His 
grace,  which  was  set  forth  with  growing  clear- 
ness and  fulness  from  the  beginning  to  the 
end.  Every  advance  in  the  presentation  of 
the  one  was  attended  or  followed  by  a  cor- 
responding advance  in  the  knowledge  of  the 
other.  Judgment  and  mercy  are  concomi- 
tants, as  well  as  mutual  opposites  or  rather 
counterparts,  being  reverse  sides  of  the  same 
divine  excellence.  Acts  or  declarations  con- 
firmatory of  one  serve  consequently  to  illus- 
trate and  enforce  the  other.  And  the  two 
series  of  progressive  and  related  lessons  move 
along  together  side  by  side  throughout  the 
whole  of  the  former  dispensation. 

While,  however,  the  gospel  was  already 
substantially  preached  before  Christ  came,  this 
was  prevailingly  done  in  a  legal  form  and 
under  legal  aspects.  The  pardon  of  sin,  for 
instance,  and  reconciliation  with  God,  were 
accomplished  by  sacrifices,  which  prefigured, 
it  is  true,  the  atonement  of  the  Son  of  God, 
and  derived  from  it  all  their  present  efficacy, 


THE  SCHEME  OF  HOLY  SCRIPTURE.         33 1 

but  were  nevertheless  a  ceremonial  institution, 
enacted  in  the  law,  to  be  performed  by  the 
offerer  himself,  and  making  up  a  part  of  his 
righteousness  in  view  of  the  law.  Mercy  came 
to  him  indeed  as  unmerited  grace  to  an 
offender,  and  yet  under  the  form  of  an 
acceptance  or  justification  procured  by  a 
performance  of  his  own,  or  an  act  in  whose 
performance  he  took  part.  The  mercy  that 
cancels  sin  did  not  drop  out  of  sight,  but  it 
could  not  stand  forth  so  conspicuously  and  in 
its  own  proper  simplicity  as  now,  when  the 
typical  sacrifice  has  been  merged  into  and 
superseded  by  the  great  reality,  and  our  entire 
pardon  and  justifying  righteousness  are  seen 
to  be  wrought  out  by  another  in  our  stead. 

And  so  long  as  the  free  grace  of  the  gospel 
was  not  yet  exhibited  in  its  fulness  it  was  also 
impossible  that  the  law  itself,  to  which  the 
former  dispensation  was  mainly  devoted,  should 
attain  its  complete  expression.  Dark  and 
threatening  as  Sinai  was,  the  law  never  ap- 
peared in  such  majesty,  was  never  enforced 
by  such  sanctions,  never  exerted  such   a  con- 


332       THE  PLACE  OF  THE  BOOK  OF  JOB  IN 

straining  power  on  men's  hearts,  and  the 
exceeding  breadth  of  the  commandment  was 
never  so  laid  open  as  in  the  transaction  on 
Calvary. 

We  have  now  to  inquire  into  the  particular 
function  assigned  to  the  book  of  Job  in  un- 
foldinor    this    blended    revelation    of   law  and 

o 

gospel.  One  obvious  characteristic  belonging 
to  it  in  common  with  the  other  poetical  books, 
and  in  which  it  stands  in  marked  contrast  with 
the  rest  of  the  Old  Testament,  is  that  it  is 
occupied  with  what  is  individual  and  personal. 
The  books  of  Moses  contain  God's  covenant 
with  Israel  as  a  nation.  The  historical  books 
record  His  dealings  with  the  people  as  such. 
The  books  of  the  prophets  make  known  His 
will  to  Israel  and  concerning  Israel  as  the 
people  of  God.  These  set  forth  the  general 
principles  and  methods  of  the  divine  adminis- 
tration. The  promises  and  threatenings  con- 
cern the  entire  body  of  the  people  or  some 
considerable  section  of  them,  and  individuals 
share  the  fortunes  of  the  mass.  If  prosperous 
abundance   is  sent   upon  an  obedient  people, 


THE  SCHEME  OF  HOLY  SCRIPTURE.         333 

the  wicked  among  them  participate  in  the 
benefit.  If  a  nation  of  transs^ressors  is  led 
into  captivity,  the  calamity  involves  the  right- 
eous with  the  rest.  But  Job  stands  alone  and 
by  himself.  He  is  dealt  with  as  an  individual, 
not  as  one  of  a  certain  race  or  nation,  and  par- 
ticularly not  as  one  of  the  chosen  seed  or 
covenant  people,  to  which  he  does  not  even 
belong.  In  his  history  we  see  the  righteous- 
ness of  God  in  its  relations  not  to  Israel,  but 
to  an  individual  man. 

The  Psalms  record  the  devout  meditations 
and  aspirations  of  pious  souls,  taking  as  their 
theme  God's  attributes.  His  word  or  His 
works.  The  Song  of  Solomon,  which  cele- 
brates the  divine  institution  of  marriage,  forms 
a  striking  parallel  to  the  forty-fifth  psalm. 
Lamentations  is  properly  an  appendix  to  the 
book  of  Jeremiah.  Leaving  these  out  of 
view  for  the  present,  the  other  three  poetical 
books  are  occupied  with  the  righteousness  of 
God  as  verified  in  the  experience  of  men. 
Proverbs  exhibits  this  verification  as  a  fact  of 
ordinary  observation.     On  the  whole,  and  as  a 


334   THE  PLACE  OF  THE  BOOK  OF  JOB  IN 

general  rule,  and  agreeably  to  the  native  ten- 
dencies of  things,  virtue  is  rewarded  and  vice 
is  punished.  But  general  rules  have  their 
exceptions.  And  to  the  common  order  of 
Providence  as  exhibited  in  Proverbs  there 
are  two  apparent  exceptions.  These  are  so 
serious  in  their  character,  and  withal  of  so 
frequent  occurrence,  as  to  demand  attention. 
There  may  be  prosperity  without  piety ;  and 
there  may  be  piety  without  prosperity.  The 
first  of  these  is  treated  in  the  book  of  Eccle- 
siastes.  It  presents  the  case  of  a  man  of  the 
rarest  wisdom,  and  with  every  facility  that 
abundant  w^ealth  and  royal  station  could  sup- 
ply, who  set  himself  with  deliberate  purpose 
to  extract  gratification  from  earthly  sources, 
but  found  that  every  thing  was  vanity.  And 
after  the  baffling  experiments  of  a  lifetime  he 
came  at  length  to  the  conclusion  that  to  fear 
God  and  keep  His  commandments  was  the^ 
only  way  to  secure  real  enjoyment  and  man's 
true  welfare. 

The  other  exception  furnishes  its  theme  to 
the  book  of  Job.     This  deals  wath  the  case  of 


THE  SCHEME  OF  HOLY  SCRIPTURE.         335 

piety  without  prosperity,  or  the  righteousness 
of  God  as  exercised  towards  pious  sufferers. 
Its  lessons  all  grow  out  of  this  theme,  or  clus- 
ter about  it.  It  is  here,  therefore,  that  we 
are  to  look  for  that  unfolding  of  doctrine 
which  belongs  to  it  in  the  system  of  the  Old 
Testament.  The  righteousness  of  God  in  its 
more  general  and  obvious  manifestations  is 
assumed  as  the  starting-point.  This  is  taken 
for  granted  as  well  understood  and  agreed 
upon  between  Job  and  his  friends  at  the  out- 
set. But  a  crisis  occurs  in  Job's  spiritual 
history  in  which  the  opinions  that  they 
have  hitherto  entertained  are  not  adequate. 
A  state  of  affairs  arises  at  variance  with  their 
defective  notions  of  the  divine  righteousness. 
In  the  struggle  that  ensues,  new  light  is  im- 
parted, and  more  accurate  conceptions  are 
reached.  God's  righteousness  had  been  in- 
adequately apprehended  in  two  respects,  be- 
longing severally  to  the  two  poles  of  Old 
Testament  truth  or  the  two  phases  of  Old 
Testament  instruction,  the  law  and  the  gospel. 
The  question  that  agitates  the  soul  of  Job  is 

15 


336   THE  PLACE  OF  THE  BOOK  OF  JOB  IN 

that  of  his  personal  relation  to  God.  Is  he 
the  object  of  the  divine  displeasure,  or  will 
God  accomplish  his  salvation?  But  in  fact 
he  knew  neither  the  extent  of  the  divine  dis- 
pleasure nor  the  greatness  of  God's  salvation. 
The  risfhteousness  of  God  condemned  more 
in  him  than  he  suspected ;  while  that  which 
he  looked  upon  as  a  sentence  of  condemna- 
tion was  a  measure  of  God's  grace. 

The  new  impressions  which  Job  gains  of 
the  extent  and  spirituality  of  the  law  of  God 
appears  from  his  altered  language  respecting 
himself.  His  oft-repeated  assertions  of  his 
rlofhteousness,  which  were  even  carried  to  the 
extent  of  chiding  with  God  as  having  done 
him  wrong  in  sending  afiflictions  upon  him 
which  he  had  not  deserved,  are  superseded  by 
penitent  confession  and  self-abhorrence.  "  I 
abhor  myself,  and  repent  in  dust  and  ashes." 
This  change  was  wrought  in  his  mind  by  the 
instruction  received  from  Elihu,  coupled  with 
God's  manifestation  of  Himself.  Elihu  took 
the  stumbling-block  out  of  his  way  which  had 
led  to  his  previous  false  conclusions,  by  show- 


THE  SCHEME  OF  HOLY  SCRIPTURE.        337 

ing  him  that  in  inflicting  extraordinary  suffer- 
ings upon  him  God  was  not  thereby  charging 
him  with  unusual  guilt.  This  cause  of  offence 
removed,  Job  could  listen  with  unprejudiced 
ear  to  Elihu's  suggestion  of  a  deeper  and 
more  spiritual  view  of  the  nature  of  sin,  as  not 
merely  consisting  in  actual  transgressions  such 
as  the  friends  had  linked  with  God's  judgments, 
but  as  represented  likewise  in  pride  of  heart 
and  evil  purpose  (xxxiii.  17).  With  his 
thoughts  thus  turned  inward,  Job  finds  rea- 
sons for  the  strokes  of  divine  chastisement 
which  he  had  not  previously  recognized,  and 
he  cannot  regard  himself  with  the  same  com- 
placency as  before. 

But  pious  men  under  the  Old  Testament 
nowhere  reach  the  platform  of  the  New  in 
this  respect ;  and  it  was  impossible  that  they 
should,  because  the  facts  on  which  the  Chris- 
tian doctrine  of  the  law  and  of  sin  is  based 
had  not  then  been  made  known.  This  ought 
to  be  borne  in  mind  in  estimating  the  lan- 
guage of  these  ancient  saints.  We  see  them 
maintain  their  own  righteousness  in  the  view 


33S   THE  PLACE  OF  THE  BOOK  OF  JOB  IN 

of  God,  when  we  would  look  rather  for 
an  humble  confession  of  utter  unworthiness. 
They  plead  with  God  to  save  them  for  His 
righteousness'  sake,  when  we  would  expect 
to  hear  them  sue  instead  for  unmerited 
mercy.  And  we  find  it  hard  to  enter  into 
their  feelings.  We  can  scarcely  acquit  them 
of  irreverence,  or  comprehend  how  such  good 
men  can  speak  as  they  do. 

It  is  true,  and  this  affords  a  partial  expla- 
nation of  the  matter,  that  these  assertions  of 
their  own  goodness  are  mostly  made  in  oppo- 
sition to  avowed  or  implied  charges  of  crimi- 
nality of  which  they  are  guiltless.  The 
Psalmists  were  often  like  Job  the  objects  of 
unjust  aspersions  and  slanders ;  and  they 
were  entitled  to  declare  their  innocence  of 
what  had  been  falsely  alleged  against  them 
with  honest  indignation.  But  they  do  not 
limit  themselves  to  the  claim  of  being  pure 
from  that  which  has  been  wrongfully  attrib- 
uted to  them,  nor  to  the  claim  of  an  integrity 
that  should  shield  them  from  the  censure  of 
men,  but  while  with  the  same  breath  confess- 


THE  SCHEME  OF  HOLY  SCRIPTURE.        339 

Ing  their  sinfulness  they  lay  claim  to  an  up- 
rightness of  such  breadth  and  purity  that  It 
can  maintain  itself  at  the  bar  of  God  and 
expect  His  approbation. 

It  is  also  true  that  In  making  their  appeals 
to  God's  righteousness  they  include  under 
this  term  His  faithfulness  as  well  as  His  jus- 
tice. They  intend  by  the  righteousness  of 
God  that  attribute  in  virtue  of  which  He  does 
right,  not  merely  in  view  of  their  deserts,  but 
in  view  of  His  own  gracious  engagements. 
They  remember  His  covenant  and  His  prom- 
ises ;  and  the  righteousness  of  God  assures 
them  that  He  will  keep  that  word  which  He 
has  mercifully  given. 

But  with  all  these  explanations  and  abate- 
ments w^e  cannot  but  feel  how  differently  the 
Apostle  Paul  Is  accustomed  to  speak  of  him- 
self, and  what  a  different  estimate  he  puts 
upon  his  own  deservings.  "  Not  by  works 
of  righteousness  which  we  have  done,  but 
according  to  His  mercy  He  saved  us."  "  I  am 
carnal,  sold  under  sin.  .  .  .  The  good  that  I 
would,  I  do  not ;  but  the  evil  which  I  would 


340   THE  PLACE  OF  THE  BOOK  OF  JOB  IN 

not,  that  I  do.  .  .  .  Oh  wretched  man  that  1 
am !  who  shall  deliver  me  from  the  body  of 
this  death  ? "  Such  an  experience  belongs 
to  the  New  Testament  exclusively.  There 
is  repentance  in  the  Old  Testament.  There 
are  confessions  of  sin.  There  are  deep  views 
of  its  greatness  and  vileness  and  enormity. 
There  are  prayers  for  forgiveness.  There 
are  fervent  breathings  after  greater  conform- 
ity to  the  will  of  God.  All  the  roots  of  the 
apostolic  experience  are  there,  but  they  are 
never  quickened  into  the  same  intensity  of 
life,  they  never  reach  the  same  expansion, 
they  never  gain  that  ascendency,  that  com- 
plete mastery  of  the  soul,  which  shapes  all 
its  thinking  and  feeling,  and  makes  its  con- 
stant attitude  before  God  that  of  helpless 
unworthiness.  And  why  ?  They  had  never 
learned  the  lesson  of  the  cross  of  Christ. 
The  vastness  of  the  provision  first  gave  an 
idea  of  the  greatness  of  the  necessity.  The 
demerit  of  sin  was  never  so  plainly  seen  as  in 
the  light  of  the  infinite  merit  of  the  atone- 
ment which  was  requisite  to  efface  it.     And 


THE  SCHEME  OF  HOLY  SCRIPTURE.         34 1 

the  utter  worthlessness  of  our  own  righteous- 
ness first  became  manifest  from  the  fact  that 
men  are  justified  without  any  worthiness  or 
deservings  of  their  own  by  simple  trust  in 
the  righteousness  of  another.  The  full  ap- 
prehension of  this  humbling  and  abasing 
yet  at  the  same  time  elevating  and  cheering 
truth  altered,  of  necessity,  the  whole  com- 
plexion of  piety.  It  changed  the  very  basis 
of  men's  standing  in  the  sight  of  God,  or 
at  least  enabled  them  to  see  more  distinctly 
than  was  possible  before  where  they  really 
did  stand.  It  swept  the  gathered  sand  and 
rubbish  from  the  rock,  and  precluded  the  pos- 
sibility of  their  imagining  that  by  heaping 
these  together  they  were  adding  to  the 
strength  of  their  position  or  the  security  of 
their  hope.  But  this,  while  it  banished  for- 
ever all  thought  of  any  claim  of  merit  or 
righteousness  in  the  sight  of  God,  gave  a 
new  and  impregnable  basis  of  confidence 
before  him,  —  a  confidence  which  no  craft  of 
Satan  and  no  storms  of  affliction  could  dis- 
turb. 


342       THE  PLACE  OF  THE  BOOK  OF  JOB  IN 

It  is,  however,  on  the  side  of  the  gospel 
that  the  lessons  of  the  book  of  Job  chiefly  lie. 
These  are  all  in  the  direction  of  the  ampler 
disclosures  to  be  subsequently  made,  though 
of  course  they  do  not  in  any  case  pass  the 
bounds  imposed  on  the.  knowledge  of  God's 
grace  for  the  time  then  present,  nor  do  they 
ever  anticipate  in  its  fulness  what  was  re- 
served for  a  brighter  future.  Piety  w^as  still, 
as  it  is  prevailingly  characterized  in  the  Old 
Testament,  "  the  fear  of  the  Lord  "  (xxviii.  28). 
The  love  of  God,  springing  from  the  knowl- 
edge and  belief  of  the  love  that  God  hath  to 
us,  had  not  yet  been  made  perfect  (i  John  iv. 
16,  18). 

In  these  unfoldings  of  gospel  truth  we  are 
not  to  expect  any  direct  presentation  of  the 
person  of  the  Messiah.  He  is  not  in  the  Old 
Testament  invoked  in  individual  straits  or 
in  present  necessities.  He  is  ever  exhibited 
rather  as  the  Hope  of  Israel  and  the  Saviour 
of  the  world.  His  coming  was  to  introduce 
an  era  of  peace  and  holiness  and  bliss.  From 
the  existing  degeneracy  and  defection  of  the 


THE  SCHEME  OF  HOLY  SCRIPTURE.         343 

people  of  God,  or  the  calamities  by  which  they 
were  threatened  or  overwhelmed,  from  the 
growing  power  of  their  adversaries  or  the  pros- 
pect of  the  downfall  of  these  haughty  foes,  the 
prophets  pointed  forward  to  Him  in  whose  days 
Judah  shall  be  saved  and  Israel  shall  dwell 
safely,  and  under  whose  beneficent  reign  all 
nations  shall  flock  to  the  mountain  of  the  Lord, 
beating  their  swords  into  ploughshares  and 
learnino^  war  no  more.  But  it  was  not  so 
clear  to  their  minds  that  this  same  Saviour 
was  the  present  deliverer  of  each  one  of  His 
people  in  his  own  individual  distress.  Hence 
suffering^  saints  in  the  time  of  their  trouble 
call  not  upon  the  name  of  the  Messiah  for 
help  and  rescue,  but  upon  the  name  of  the 
Lord,  unaware  that  they  are  directing  their 
petitions  to  the  same  person  whose  appear- 
ance amongst  men  shall  introduce  the  antici- 
pated glories  of  the  future. 

But  addressing  the  Lord  as  they  do  in 
the  capacity  of  their  covenanted  Redeemer, 
soliciting  from  Him  the  help  which  He  alone 
can  supply,  making  Him  the   sole   ground  of 

15* 


344   THE  PLACE  OF  THE  BOOK  OF  JOB  IN 

their  confidence  as  well  as  of  all  their  affec- 
tion and  desire,  it  is  in  fact,  if  not  in  form,  the 
Son  of  God  to  whom  they  make  their  appeal. 
And  all  the  knowledge  that  they  gain  of  this 
divine  Saviour,  and  the  homage  that  they" 
learn  to  pay  to  Him,  and  the  trust  that  they 
repose  in  Him,  is  a  direct  preparation  for 
the  doctrine  of  Christ.  They  knew  not  at 
the  time  that  this  line  of  instruction  which 
they  were  following,  converged  upon  that  other 
line  which  taus^ht  them  of  the  Son  of  David 
and  the  King  of  Israel.  The  point  of  junc- 
tion was  visibly  reached  when  the  word  was 
made  flesh.  Then  the  divine  *  Redeemer 
and  the  expected  Saviour  w^ere  consciously 
identified;  the  Lord  from  heaven  to  whom 
each  struggling  soul  had  looked  for  succor, 
and  the  son  of  Abraham  in  whom  all  the 
families  of  the  earth  were  to  be  blessed  ;  He 
who  baffled  Satan's  wiles  and  rescued  Job 
from  his  snare,  and  the  seed  of  the  woman 
who  was  to  crush  the  serpent's  head  and 
restore  the  fallen  race  of  man. 

*  The 'relation  of  xix.  25   to  the  Messiah  is  more  particu- 
larly stated,  page  213. 


THE  SCHEME  OF  HOLY  SCRIPTURE.       345 

Additional  elements  of  Messianic  instruc- 
tion are  found  in  the  typical  character  of  Job 
and  that  of  Elihu.  They  are  each  representa- 
tive of  a  class  which  finds  its  highest  exem- 
plification in  Christ.  Whether  the  type  was 
discerned  to  be  such  by  the  writer  of  this 
book  and  his  original  readers,  it  might  be 
difficult  to  determine.  But  whether  it  was  or 
not,  it  supplies  an  exemplar  conformed  to 
the  model  of  Him  who  was  afterwards  to  be 
revealed.  It  presents  a  character  or  an  office, 
which  would  be  better  understood  and  more 
correctly  appreciated  when  realized  in  Christ 
for  having  been  known  already  and  grown 
familiar  as  exhibited  in  others.  And  the 
idea  to  which  it  gives  rise  is  certainly  linked 
with  the  expected  Saviour  in  other  parts  of 
the  Old  Testament  in  a  manner  which  shows 
that  this  connection  was  patent  to  the  in- 
spired penmen  themselves. 

The  typical  correspondence  between  Job 
as  a  pious  man  sorely  afflicted  and  the  man 
of  sorrows  has  been  suggested  in  a  former 
chapter  (p.  216).     This  is  no  mere  casual  rela- 


34^       THE  PLACE  OF  THE  BOOK  OF  JOB  IN 

tion  of  accidental  resemblance,  but  rests  upon 
a  general  principle  of  the  divine  administra- 
tion. It  is  a  principle  consistently  applied  in 
God's  dealings  with  His  children,  that  they 
are  made  perfect  through  sufferings.  It  was 
thus  with  Job.  It  has  been  thus,  and  will  be, 
with  many  more  in  every  age.  The  circum- 
stances and  the  particular  mode  of  its  applica- 
tion may  differ  greatly,  but  the  law  is  the 
same.  It  was  thus  with  God's  own  Son  when 
revealed  in  human  flesh.  He  too  learned 
obedience  by  the  things  which  He  suffered ; 
and,  being  made  perfect,  He  became  the  Au- 
thor of  eternal  salvation  unto  all  them  that 
obey  Him.  This  uniform  method  of  God's 
grace  is  especially  dwelt  upon  by  the  Psalmists, 
and  its  highest  application  is  deduced  or  fore- 
seen by  them.  On  the  basis  of  their  own  ex- 
perience of  trial,  with  its  resulting  benefits  to 
them,  and  through  them  to  others,  they  re- 
peatedly (e.o-,  Ps.  vi.,  Ixix.,  Ixxi.,  etc.)  portray 
the  righteous  man  oppressed  by  calamities. 
The  picture  which  they  draw  is  mostly  a 
general  one,  such  as  has   its  counterpart   in 


THE  SCHEME  OF  HOLY  SCRIPTURE.         347 

great  numbers  of  God's  faithful  servants, 
who,  though  weak,  imperfect,  and  sinful,  have 
passed  thiough  deep  waters  and  found  safety 
in  delivering  grace.  But  sometimes  (as  in  Ps. 
xxii.)  the  picture  is  an  ideal  rather  than  a 
portrait.  The  human  characteristics  are  pre- 
served, but  the  excellencies  are  heightened  till 
they  have  become  faultless  ;  imperfections  are 
removed  till  absolute  sinlessness  is  reached  ; 
suffering  is  followed  by  unbounded  exaltation 
and  glory  ;  and  the  blessed  results  of  the  sor- 
rows swell  to  proportions  that  admit  no  limita- 
tion of  space  or  time.  The  picture  is  plainly 
human,  and  yet  it  transcends  all  ordinary 
human  experience.  It  has  and  can  have  but 
one  realization:  the  Holy  Sufferer  is  the 
incarnate  Son  of  God. 

Elihu  is  himself  such  a  "  messenger  "  as  he 
describes  (xxxiii.  23,  24),  "an  interpreter,  one 
among  a  thousand,  to  shew  unto  man  his 
uprightness."  He  had  been  selected  from  all 
others  and  sent  of  God  to  expound  to  Job  the 
divine  will  and  purpose  in  this  mysterious  dis- 
pensation, and  to  make  known  to  him  his  duty 


34^       THE  PLACE  OF  THE  BOOK  OF  JOB  IN 

in  the  case.  And  this  was  with  the  result 
that  he  had  foreshown.  "  Then  He  is  gracious 
unto  him,  and  saith,  Dehver  him  from  going 
down  to  the  pit :  I  have  found  a  ransom." 
EHhu  acts  the  part  of  a  divinely  commissioned 
and  effectual  instructor,  a  teacher  who  is  the 
instrument  of  salvation  to  his  suffering  and 
needy  friend.  He  fulfils  in  a  lower  sense  the 
very  function  of  the  great  teacher  and  prophet 
of  the  Lord,  in  response  to  whose  prevalent 
vindication  the  same  reply  is  given,  "  De- 
liver him  from  going  down  to  the  pit :  I  have 
found  a  ransom."  Only  the  ransom  is  then 
no  longer  limited  to  the  figurative  sense  in 
which  Elihu  uses  it  of  the  sufferer's  own  im- 
proved spiritual  state  as  an  adequate  ground 
or  reason  for  his  release  from  further  endur- 
ance. The  great  Teacher  has  provided  a 
ransom  in  the  strict  and  proper  sense  for  the 
release  of  His  people,  now  and  forever,  from 
the  bondage  that  oppresses  them. 

As  the  book  of  Job  circles  about  the  con- 
flict in  which  this  man  of  God  was  engaged, 
its  lessons  mainly  concern  the  foe  with  whom 


THE  SCHEME  OF  HOLY  SCRIPTURE.         349 

he  had  to  contend  on  the  one  hand,  and  the 
supports  and  encouragements  vouchsafed  to 
him  on  the  other.  His  real  adversary  was 
not  God,  as  his  friends  alleged,  and  as  he 
apprehended,  but  Satan.  And  here  a  new 
view  is  opened  into  the  kingdom  of  dark- 
ness. The  great  foe  to  human  peace  and 
goodness  is  here  for  the  first  time  in  Script- 
ure disclosed  in  his  proper  person  and  char- 
acter. The  serpent  had  tempted  Eve ;  yet 
though  the  narrative  of  the  fall  requires  the 
assumption  of  a  spiritual  agent  concerned 
in  the  transaction,  his  presence  is  not  dis- 
tinctly mentioned,  but  left  to  be  vaguely 
inferred.  Here,  however,  he  is  explicitly 
named ;  his  spiritual  nature,  his  malignity, 
his  great  power,  his  subtlety,  and  untiring 
assiduity  of  evil  are  exposed.  At  the  same 
time  it  is  shown  that  he  is  limited,  restrained, 
and  overruled,  and  good  brought  out  of  evil 
in  spite  of  his  devices  by  the  gracious  provi- 
dence of  God.  This  is  an  important  advance 
toward  the  amplitude  of  New  Testament 
revelation  on  this  subject,  in  which  a  disclos- 


350   THE  PLACE  OF  THE  BOOK  OF  JOB  IN 

ure  is  made  not  merely  of  a  single  adversary, 
but  of  the  whole  hierarchy  of  evil,  embrac- 
ing principalities,  powers,  and  multitudes 
of  spirits  of  wickedness ;  and  in  which  a 
broader  view  is  afforded  of  the  territory 
covered  by  the  conflict  and  of  the  method 
in  which  it  is  conducted,  as  well  as  a  height- 
ened assurance  of  victory  over  foes  already 
vanquished  by  the  Captain  of  our  salvation, 
and  who  shall  be  bruised  under  the  feet  of 
each  of  His  people  shortly. 

We  see  in  Job  how  his  afflictions  were  a 
test  of  the  sincerity  and  strength  of  his  pious 
fear,  and  how  his  confidence  in  God's  right- 
eousness carried  him  successfully  through ; 
how  he  clung  to  his  belief,  in  spite  of  all  out- 
ward appearances,  that  God  was  faithful  and 
would  not  desert  His  servant,  and  how  at 
length  he  learned  that  affliction  might  be 
converted  into  a  benefit.  But  the  disciple 
of  Christ  has  a  firm  support  and  a  wealth  of 
consolation  altogether  new  in  the  assurance 
afforded  him  of  the  infinite  love  of  God.  "  He 
that  spared  not  His  own   Son,  but  delivered 


THE  SCHEME  OF  HOLY  SCRIPTURE.        35  I 

Him  up  for  us  all,  how  shall  He  not  with  Him 
also  freely  give  us  all  things?"  A U  things 
are  yours,  death  as  well  as  life,  sorrow  as  well 
as  joy.  In  tribulation,  distress,  and  persecu- 
tion, we  are  more  than  conquerors,  through 
Him  that  loved  us.  For  neither  death  nor 
life,  nor  angels,  nor  principalities,  nor  powers, 
nor  things  present,  nor  things  to  come  shall 
be  able  to  separate  us  from  the  love  of  God, 
which  is  in  Christ  Jesus  our  Lord.  In  this 
consciousness  the  child  of  God  glories  in 
tribulation,  assured  that  he  shall  be  kept 
from  real  harm  by  his  Heavenly  Father, 
knowing  that  sorrow  is  one  of  the  appointed 
agencies  of  grace,  since  tribulation  worketh 
patience,  experience,  and  hope  that  maketh 
not  ashamed;  looking  unto  Jesus,  and  re- 
joicing to  be  conformed  to  Him  who  endured 
the  cross,  despising  the  shame.  Hence  the 
striking  difference  between  the  demeanor  of 
the  apostles  and  followers  of  Christ  under 
calamity  and  that  of  the  saints  of  God  in  the 
Old  Testament.  The  moans  and  complaints 
of  desertion,  which  are  uniformly  heard  from 


352   THE  PLACE  OF  THE  BOOK  OF  JOB  IN 

the  latter  in  times  of  sore  distress,  grow 
directly  out  of  the  legal  aspect  under  which 
they  contemplated  the  character  of  God.  But 
outward  distress  never  brings  a  shadow  over 
the  spirits  of  the  apostles.  It  is  to  them  no 
token  of  the  divine  displeasure,  but  is  rather 
hailed  as  an  evidence  ,of  sonship.  It  is  the 
love  of  God  which  sends  affliction,  which  sup- 
ports under  affliction,  and  which  delivers  out 
of  affliction. 

The  gospel  reveals  also,  as  it  was  never  ap- 
prehended before,  the  heavenly  inheritance, 
that  far  more  exceeding  and  eternal  weight  of 
glory,  with  which  the  sufferings  of  this  pres- 
ent time  are  not  worthy  to  be  compared.  Job 
was  brought  in  his  conflict  into  contact  with 
the  doctrine  of  immortality ;  but  he  only 
attained  a  limited  conception  of  this  blessed 
truth,  and  never  drew  from  it  that  abundant 
comfort  and  solace  which,  when  rightly  under- 
stood, it  is  adapted  to  supply.  His  confidence 
that  God  would  not  forever  withhold  His  fa- 
vor from  him,  coupled  with  the  fact  that  there 
was  no  room  left  for  that  favor  to  display 


THE  SCHEME  OF  HOLY  SCRIPTURE.        353 

itself  in  the   present  life,  had  driven  him  t?o 
the  conclusion  that  it  must  be  granted  to  him 
in  the  world  to  come.     He  laid  hold  of  his 
immortality  to  steady  himself  in  the  absence 
of   any  earthly  hope.     It   never  occurred   to 
him  to  prefer  it  to  every  earthly  hope,  even 
if  this  latter  had  been  possessed  in  the  fullest 
measure.     Life  without  God's  favor  and  bless- 
ino-  would  not  indeed  have  been  an  object  of 
desire  to  him  any  more  than  to  the   Psalmist, 
who  exclaims  (Ps.  Ixxiii.  25):  "Whom  have  I 
in  heaven  but  Thee  ?  and  there  is  none  upon 
earth  that  I  desire  besides  Thee."     But  life 
with   God's  favor  was    his   chief    inheritance 
and  his  portion.     The  idea  had  not  presented 
itself  to  his  mind  that  the  boundless  hereafter 
blessed  with  God's  presence  was  a  more  de- 
sirable portion  than  this  brief  life  could   be 
with  the  same  divine  presence  and  blessing. 
He  had  faith  that  God  would  vindicate   His 
servant  and  appear  upon  his  side  in  the  fu- 
ture state.     But  he  had  not  so  far  surmounted 
the   gloom   of    the   grave    and    the    shadowy 
nature  of  the  world  of  spirits  as  to  transport 


354   THE  PLACE  OF  THE  BOOK  OF  JOB  IN 

into  it  the  full  conception  of  a  life  with  God, 
a  life  free  from  sin  and  every  form  of  sorrow, 
a  glory  and  bliss  eternal.  It  was  not  until 
the  divine  Saviour  had  Himself  appeared,  and 
the  magnitude  of  redemption  and  its  unend- 
ing results  had  in  consequence  been  disclosed, 
that  men  could  say  with  the  Apostle  Paul, 
that  though  to  live  w^as  Christ,  yet  to  die 
w^as  gain. 

The  sense  of  immortality  to  w^hich  Job 
attained  w^as  likewise  echoed  by  the  Psalm- 
ists, who  speak  upon  occasion  of  the  future 
life,  but  in  ambiguous  and  doubtful  phrase, 
which  leaves  it  uncertain  how  clear  their 
conceptions  may  have  been.  The  prophets 
reached  the  same  result  by  a  somew^hat  dif- 
ferent route.  God's  covenant  faithfulness  to 
Israel  secured  His  people  as  a  whole  in  all 
perpetuity  against  death  and  destruction ;  or 
if  their  fortunes  were  so  broken  that  they 
seemed  dead  and  buried,  He  would  accom- 
plish their  resurrection.  And  this  deliver- 
ance from  death  and  from  all  the  evils  result- 
ing from   the   fall,  w^hich  was   guaranteed   to 


THE  SCHEME  OF  HOLY  SCRIPTURE.         355 

the  body  as  a  whole,  was  secured  likewise  to 
its  constituent  members. 

But  these  flashes  of  assurance  which  we 
find  in  the  Old  Testament  are  as  nothing 
compared  with  the  clear  and  steady  light  shed 
on  the  future  life  in  the  New  Testament. 
And  this  fulness  of  revelation  has  revolution- 
ized the  whole  idea  and  aim  of  life.  The 
believer  has  learned  to  regard  the  transient 
present  as  of  small  account  in  comparison  with 
the  eternity  that  lies  before  him,  to  set  his 
affection  on  things  above,  not  on  things  on 
the  earth,  to  lay  up  his  treasure  in  heaven,  to 
look  not  at  the  things  which  are  seen  and 
which  are  temporal,  but  to  look  at  the  things 
which  are  not  seen  and  w^hich  are  eternal. 
With  such  a  blissful  portion  in  prospect,  what 
are  all  the  light  and  momentary  sorrows  to 
which  he  can  be  subjected  here.'* 


THE   DOCTRINE   OF   IMMORTALITY  IN 
THE   OLD   TESTAMENT. 


EXPLANATORY    NOTE. 


THE   DOCTRINE  OF  IMMORTALITY  IN  THE 
OLD   TESTAMENT. 

nPHERE  is  a  broad  and  palpable  distinction 
between  .Old  and  New  Testament  saints 
in  their  attitude  relative  to  the  future  life. 
And  the  desire  to  exhibit  this  sharply  and 
strongly  may  perhaps  have  led  to  the  employ- 
ment of  language  that  is  capable  of  being  mis- 
understood or  misinterpreted.  In  what  has 
been  said  upon  this  subject  in  this  volume, 
there  is  no  disposition  to  deny  or  overlook  the 
fact  that  from  the  very  beginning  of  the  old 
economy  the  immortality  of  the  soul  and  a 
future  state  of  unending  existence  w^ere  re- 
vealed and  were  believed.  The  indications 
of  this  are  clear.  This  was  a  common  doc- 
trine throughout  the  ancient  world.  The  very 
heathen  had  some  notion,  though  vague  and 

16 


360         THE    DOCTRINE    OF    IMMORTALITY 

incorrect,  of  a  life  hereafter.  This  truth  is 
involved  in  the  account  of  man's  creation,  who 
alone  of  all  terrestrial  beings  was  made  in 
God's  image  (Gen.  i.  27),  and  whose  soul, 
breathed  into  him  by  the  Lord,  is  expressly 
distinguished  from  his  material  body  (Gen. 
ii.  7  ;  comp.  Eccles.  xii.  7).  It  is  also  involved 
in  the  account  of  the  tree  of  life  in  the  Garden 
of  Eden,  and  in  the  law  there  given  rewarding 
obedience  with  life  and  making,  death  the 
penalty  of  transgression  (comp.  Prov.  iii.  18, 
viii.  35,  36,  xii.  28,  xiv.  27,  xv.  24),  as  well  as 
in  the  promise  of  redemption  from  the  damage 
of  the  fall  (Gen.  iii.  1 5  ;  comp.  Isa.  xxv.  8, 
xxvi.  19).  It  is  explicitly  recognized  in  the 
translation  of  Enoch  (Gen.  v.  24),  as  subse- 
quently in  that  of  Elijah  (2  Kings  ii.  i),  and  in 
the  reappearance  of  Samuel  (i  Sam.  xxviii.  14) ; 
in  the  expression  used  of  the  deceased  patri- 
archs and  others,  "  gathered  to  his  people " 
(Gen.  xxv.  8),  "  gathered  unto  their  fathers " 
(Judges  ii.  10),  which  is  clearly  distinguished 
from  their  burial,  and  must  therefore  relate  not 
to  their  bodies  laid  in  the  ancestral  tomb,  but 


IN    THE    OLD    TESTAMENT.  36 1 

to  their  joining  those  who  had  gone  before 
them,  in  the  world  of  spirits  ;    in  the  special 
term  "Sheol"(Gen.  xxxvii.  35),  employed  to 
designate    the   region  of   the   dead,   which  is 
obscured  in  the  common  English  version  by 
being   sometimes   translated  "  the   grave "  or 
"pit,"  and  sometimes  "hell,"  though  it  denotes 
neither  the  place  of  interment  nor  the  place  of 
future  torment,  but  the  common  receptacle  of 
departed  spirits,  into  which  all  men  pass  at 
death.      When    Isaiah  (xiv.  9,   £f.)   represents 
the    mighty  dead    in    Sheol    as   taunting  the 
deceased  monarch  of  Babylon  with  his  down- 
fall, the  language  is  no  doubt  figurative ;    but 
it  is  based  upon  and  lends  its  sanction  to  the 
current  doctrine   of    a   continued,   conscious, 
and  intellio^ent  existence   after  death.     Pos- 
sibly  an  intelligence   beyond    that  which    is 
possessed    in  this  world  may  be  ascribed  to 
the  departed  (Job  xxviii.  22),  where  the  wis- 
dom that  is  "hid  from  the  eyes  of  all  living" 
is    said    to  have  been  at  least  heard   of   by 
"  destruction  and  death  ;  "  that  is,  by  those  who 
people  the  realm  over  which  death  holds  sway. 


362  THE    DOCTRINE    OF    IMMORTALITY 

The  burial  of  the  bodies  of  the  dead, 
instead  of  burning  them  or  disposing  of  them 
in  some  other  way,  is  a  token  that  in  the 
popular  belief  they  were  still  regarded  as  a 
part  of  the  person,  and  were  not  to  be 
destroyed,  but  preserved  in  anticipation  of  a 
future  resurrection.  And  the  explicit  direc- 
tions given  by  Jacob  (Gen.  xlix.  29)  and  by 
Joseph  (Gen.  1.  24,  25),  that  their  bodies 
should  be  taken  to  the  land  of  Canaan,  seems 
to  indicate  the  interpretation  which  they  put 
upon  the  promise  so  often  repeated,  "  To  thee 
will  I  give  this  land,  and  to  thy  seed  "  (Gen. 
xiii.  15,  XXXV.  12),  as  pledging  to  them  a  per- 
sonal share  in  the  actual  possession  of  that 
land,  or  at  least  of  what  was  typified  and  repre- 
sented by  it.  They  as  well  as  their  seed  have 
the  assurance  of  a  part  in  the  ultimate  accom- 
plishment; so  that  the  representation  made 
in  Heb.  xi.  13-16,  of  the  faith  of  the  patri- 
archs, is  amply  sustained.  When  further  the 
Lord  calls  Himself  (Ex.  iii.  6)  "the  God  of 
Abraham,  the  God  of  Isaac,  and  the  God  of 
Jacob,"  this  establishes  or  recognizes  a  rela- 


IN    THE    OLD    TESTAMENT.  363 

tion,  which,  as  our  Saviour  expounds  (Matt. 
xxii.  32),  and  as  all  must  have  felt,  could  not 
be  limited  to  this  life,  but  must  have  spread 
itself  over  the  entire  future  of  their  being. 
To  which  may  be  added  that  the  popular 
belief  is  reflected  likewise  in  the  impious  arts 
of  necromancers,  and  in  the  criminal  conduct 
of  those  who  resorted  to  them  (i  Sam.  xxviii. 
7,  8,  Isa.  viii.  19).  And  what  is  thus  already 
taught  in  the  very  beginning  of  the  Old  Tes- 
tament is  repeated  and  enlarged  in  the  com- 
munications subsequently  made  through  the 
Psalmists  and  the  Prophets. 

Still,  though  these  things  are  true,  and  in  a 
just  view  of  the  Old  Testament  should  not  be 
lost  sight  of,  the  wide  chasm  remains  between 
those  who  preceded  and  those  who  followed 
the  advent  of  the  Son  of  God.  The  com- 
pleted doctrine  of  Christ  and  the  greatness  of 
the  redemption  which  He  achieved,  His  own 
actual  return  from  the  state  of  the  dead,  and 
His  ascension  to  heaven  as  the  forerunner 
and  type  of  His  people,  opened  a  new  view 
and  poured  fresh  light  upon  the  mystery  of 


364         THE    DOCTRINE    OF    IMMORTALITY 

the  world  to  come ;  and  abundant  springs  of 
consolation,  previously  untasted,  gushed  forth 
for   suffering    and    tempted    souls.      All    the 
instructions  previously  given  were  in  compar- 
ison vague,  obscure,  and  indistinct.     Both  in 
the  promises  of  God  and  in  the  hopes  of  the 
people,  this  life  had  been  emphasized  rather 
than  the  next.     The  present  life  was  promi- 
nently held  up  and  looked  to  as  the  sphere 
both  of  duty  and  of  enjoyment.     The  first 
thing  to  be  learned,  and  that  to  which  the 
early  lessons  of  revelation  and  of  divine  disci- 
plinary training  were  devoted,  was  the  signifi- 
cance of  a  life  with  God  here  as  a  life  of  faith 
and  obedience.     Men  were  taught  to  sanctify 
their  present  activity  and  present  experiences. . 
If  these  were    duly  attended   to,  the  future 
might  be  safely  left  with  God,  even  though 
few  explicit  disclosures  had  been  made  con- 
cerning ,it.     The  proper  conception  of  a  life 
with    God    on    earth   was    the  only  basis  on 
which  it  was  possible  to  construct  a  correct 
idea   of   a   life    with    God    in    heaven.     The 
former  truth  was  first  inculcated,  therefore,  as 


IN    THE    OLD    TESTAMENT.  365 

a  necessary  preliminary  to  any  just  apprehen- 
sion of  the  latter.  The  mere  continuance  of 
spiritual  being  is  a  philosophical  dogma,  not 
a  religious  truth.  An  immortality  without 
God  is  devoid  of  all  reality  or  significance, 
and  falls  to  the  level  of  the  pagan  notion, 
which  is  as  far  as  possible  from  all  that  is 
taught  us  in  the  word  of  God. 

Hence,  though  the  germs  of  the  gospel 
doctrine  of  a  blessed  immortality  are  trace- 
able everywhere  in  the  Old  Testament,  the 
power  of  this  truth  was  not  apprehended,  nor 
were  all  its  relations  perceived.  It  is  with 
this  as  with  much  beside,  with  the  deity  of 
the  Messiah  for  example,  which  was  known 
and  distinctly  declared,  and  yet  no  such  place 
was  assigned  to  it  in  the  system  of  truth  as  is 
given  to  it  in  the  New  Testament,  and  as  we 
now  see  properly  belongs  to  it.  So  with  the 
doctrine  of  immortality,  the  ancient  saints 
did  not  recur  to  it  in  trouble,  nor  draw  from 
it  the  manifold  consolation  which  it  is  capable 
of  supplying.  They  did  not  apply  it  to  the 
solution  of  the  perplexed  problems  of  God's 


366         THE    DOCTRINE    OF   IMMORTALITY 

providence.  They  did  not  go  forth  to  it  in 
glad  anticipation,  and  fix  their  hopes  upon  it 
as  their  chief  and  highest  portion. 

The  aged  patriarchs  indeed  anticipate 
their  departure  with  composure,  and  lay  them- 
selves down  peacefully  to  die.  There  is  no 
lamentation  in  the  prospect  of  this  inevitable 
event,  no  regrets  at  leaving  the  world,  no 
wish  expressed  that  they  might  live  longer. 
The  moans  and  complaints  of  Job  and  the 
Psalmists  are  invariably  uttered  under  a  sense 
of  desertion.  They  are  under  a  cloud  as 
they  seem  to  themselves  to  be  going  down  to 
death.  They  interpret  the  providence  which 
threatens  their  dissolution  as  the  withdrawal 
of  God's  favor.  This  is  the  secret  of  their 
gloom,  not  that  they  must  die,  but  that  God 
is  alienated  from  them.  If  so,  they  are  with- 
out hope  ;  they  are  ruined  here  and  hereafter. 
Hence  their  dismal  complaints.  But  where 
is  there,  even  from  the  most  favored  of  these 
ancient  worthies,  a  clear,  outspoken  testimony 
like  that  of  the  apostle  Paul  as  he  neared  the 
en>i  of  his  earthly  career  ?     "  I  am  now  ready 


IN   THE    OLD    TESTAMENT.  367 

to  be  offered,  and  the  time  of  my  departure 
is  at  hand.  .  .  .  Henceforth  there  is  laid  up 
for  me  a  crown  of  righteousness,  which  the 
Lord,  the  righteous  Judge,  shall  give  me  at 
that  day :  and  not  to  me  only,  but  unto  all 
them  also  that  love  His  appearing"  (2  Tim. 
iv.  6,  8). 


16* 


ANALYSIS 


OF 


THE     BOOK     OFJOB. 


E\)tmt :  STfte  ^nitptation  of  Ifob. 

Introduction,  i.  1-5. 

Job's  pious  character  and  happy  estate. 

First  Stage  of  the  Temptation,  i.  6-22. 

The  loss  of  his  property  and  children ;  Job  victori- 
ous over  the  temptation. 

Second  Stage  of  the  Temptation,  ii.  i-io. 

The  infliction  upon  his  own  person  ;  Job  still  vic- 
torious. 

Third  Stage  of  the  Temptation,  ii.  ii-xlii.  17. 

The  persistence  of   suffering ;    Job's   struggle  and 
ultimate  deliverance. 

Preliminary  statement,  ii.  11-13. 
The  coming  of  Job's  three  friends. 


ANALYSIS    OF    THE    BOOK    OF   JOB.  369 

a.  The  Struggle,  iii.-xxxi. 

Job's  complaint,  chap.  iii. 

The  discourses  of  Job  and  his  three  friends,  iv.- 
xxxi. 

First  Series,  iv.-xiv. 

Job  in  unreHeved  despair. 

Second  Series,  xv.-xxi. 

Job  rises  from  despair  to  hope,  and  vanquishes  the 
temptation  in  his  second  reply  to  the  second  friend. 

Third  Series,  xxii.-xxxi. 

Job  silences  his  friends,  but  the  enigma  remains. 

b.  The  Deliverance,  xxxii.-xlii. 

Elihu's  theoretical  solution,  xxxii.-xxxvii.,  which  is 
preliminary  to 

The  Lord's  practical  solution,  or  intervention  for 
the  rescue  of  Job,  xxxviii.-xlii. 

1.  Spiritual,  xxxviii.  i-xlii.  6. 

The  Lord  manifests  himself  to  Job,  thereby  bring- 
ing him  to  humility  and  penitence. 

2.  External,  xlii.  7-17. 

Job  righted  before  his  friends,  and  his  former  pros- 
perity doubled. 


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icr-^ 


Date  Due 


HOrr/Vv  / -, 


BS1415.8.G79 


The  arg 


"^ent  Of  the  book  of  Job 


mii",nt !?:  "^"^o'ogical  Se, 


^;"f;y-SpeerL>brary 


1 1012  00043  7543 


